The UN’s chief humanitarian coordinator has said aid provided by the UN cannot continue unless the Taliban lift their ban on women working for aid agencies in Afghanistan.
Martin Griffiths, the head of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, is due to travel to Kabul soon to discuss the impasse.
Although he said he did not want to pre-empt the talks and was willing to consider workarounds to the ban, his remarks suggest a stalemate is developing between the UN and the taliban this could lead to the elimination of billions in long-term aid.
There are already reports that hundreds of children are showing up at hospitals with pneumonia during the harsh winter. No less than 150 NGOs and aid agencies have suspended all or part of his work because of the ban. The UN as an organization is not yet subject to the same ban on working for women, but much of its aid program is provided by NGOs.
Griffiths said UN flights carrying money for humanitarian aid to Kabul had already been suspended pending a break in the Taliban ban. Aid is provided in cash due to US sanctions.
Griffiths told the BBC: “Without the work of women, we cannot meet the needs of the people who are in fact the main focus of humanitarian aid for women and girls. So it’s a practical question. It is beyond rights. It is also practical.
He added: “There is a lot of experience in Afghanistan, even today, where there is a decree, but it is not applied consistently in different parts of the country. There are now parts of the country where women can work. So we will do everything we can to work around the problem and make things work. I don’t want to speculate at this point what will happen if the edict is not universally [enforced]but I must say that I do not see how we would continue.
We will do everything we can to be able to stay and stay and deliver. These are particularly difficult circumstances, I can’t remember a place where we were confronted with such a series of impediments. But humanitarians spend their lives negotiating, as well as delivering.
He continued: “We are here for 28 million people in Afghanistan. It’s the biggest humanitarian aid program in the world, so it’s a blow to our ability to deliver.
The ban was imposed on women working in NGOs Three weeks ago after the Kandahar-based Taliban said there was evidence the hijab was not strictly enforced.
There have been signs that some ministries disagreed with the ban, but experience since August 2021 when the Taliban regained control of the country shows that extremist Pashtuns based in Kandahar come to dominate , leaving other Taliban members to explain and implement their decisions. Many aid agencies are testing whether the ban is enforced in practice in local communities, particularly in the health sector.
Griffiths also sought to refute “unnecessary slanders” that UN humanitarian aid is being subverted by the Taliban who create fake aid agencies that then divert aid for the Taliban.
Griffiths said “money is numbered and labeled and used for the purpose for which it is given. It is used by humanitarian agencies of the United Nations system. It’s not sort of a street leak. So yes, the funds are coming in. But they are very tightly controlled.
“I would not agree with the idea that the Taliban depend on international funding for their survival. The Taliban raise funds through taxes, all kinds of sources and their administration of Afghanistan. I don’t think the United Nations system is that banker.
Afghan Deputy Prime Minister Mawlavi Abdul Kabir continued to send mixed signals about the ban, telling the Secretary-General’s Deputy Special Representative for Afghanistan Markus Potzel in a new meeting that learning religious and modern sciences was the right of every Afghan, including women. He said the government was still working out the details of how women could be educated.
The UN Security Council is expected to discuss the NGO crisis at a closed-door meeting requested by Japan and the United Arab Emirates on January 13 before Griffiths departs for Afghanistan.
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