Taliban enforcing face-cover order for female TV anchors

ISLAMABAD — Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers on Sunday started imposing an order requiring all feminine TV information anchors within the nation to cowl their faces whereas on-air. The transfer is a part of a hard-line shift drawing condemnation from rights activists.

After the order was introduced Thursday, solely a handful of reports shops complied. However on Sunday, most feminine anchors have been seen with their faces coated after the Taliban’s Vice and Advantage Ministry started imposing the decree.

The Data and Tradition Ministry beforehand introduced that the coverage was “ultimate and non-negotiable.”

“It’s simply an outdoor tradition imposed on us forcing us to put on a masks and that may create an issue for us whereas presenting our packages,” stated Sonia Niazi, a TV anchor with TOLOnews. In an act of solidarity with feminine colleagues, the channel’s male personnel coated their faces with masks, together with the principle night information reader.

An area media official confirmed his station had obtained the order final week however on Sunday it was pressured to implement it after being instructed it was not up for dialogue. He spoke on situation he and his station stay nameless for concern of retribution from Taliban authorities.

In the course of the Taliban’s final time in energy in Afghanistan from 1996-2001, they imposed overwhelming restrictions on ladies, requiring them to put on the all-encompassing burqa and barring them from public life and training.

After they seized energy once more in August, the Taliban initially appeared to have moderated considerably their restrictions, asserting no costume code for ladies. However in latest weeks, they’ve made a pointy, hard-line pivot that has confirmed the worst fears of rights activists and additional difficult Taliban dealings with an already distrustful worldwide group.

Earlier this month, the Taliban ordered all ladies in public to put on head-to-toe clothes that leaves solely their eyes seen. The decree stated ladies ought to depart the house solely when obligatory and that male relations would face punishment for ladies’s costume code violations, beginning with a summons and escalating to court docket hearings and jail time.

The Taliban management has additionally barred ladies from attending college after the sixth grade, reversing earlier guarantees by Taliban officers that ladies of all ages could be allowed an training.