We’re convicted of being women, says newsreader ordered by Taliban to cover face

Each evening when she returns home from a day's work as a television reporter, Sohaila Yousofi and her father have the same difficult discussion.

He wants her to leave her profession because it is too dangerous, particularly for a young woman working under Afghanistan's newly restored Taliban regime.

She says she has studied and worked hard to get her dream job and refuses to give up, even as she feels herself being slowly suffocated by the growing weight of restrictions on women.

As time goes on with no sign of respite, the 21-year-old feels her defiance waning however.

In recent weeks she and her colleagues have been the very public faces of the latest Taliban edict, ordering women to cover their faces outside the home, preferably with a burqa.

The Taliban made it clear that the order extended to women television presenters and journalists. If women did not comply, then the feared ministry of vice and virtue would punish their husbands, fathers and brothers.

For the past few weeks Ms Yousofi and her colleagues have gone on air wearing Covid-style surgical masks as well as their headscarves. For the first week, her male colleagues at 1TV wore masks in solidarity.

“It's difficult to speak with a mask. It's difficult to breathe with a mask. We cannot breathe properly,” she told the Telegraph last week.

“What crime are we convicted of? It's a crime to be a woman, it's a crime to be a girl.”

Ms Yousofi and her female colleagues were already having to face the difficulties common to all journalists in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. Many say they are pressured by the new regime over what to cover and what to ignore. There is fear and self-censorship. The masks are now an extra humiliation for the channel's dwindling number of women journalists.

The edict has followed a series of orders curtailing women's freedom and an about-turn on Taliban promises to let girls attend secondary school from March. Women now cannot travel long distances without a chaperone and have been removed from some government jobs.

Ms Yousofi wonders how long women will be allowed to work as journalists and fears the edicts are an attempt to remove women from Afghanistan's public society.

Richard Bennett, the United Nations special rapporteur on human rights in Afghanistan, agrees. After a recent trip to Kabul he said the Taliban's policies showed a “pattern of absolute gender segregation and are aimed at making women invisible in the society”.

Small groups of women demonstrators have braved arrest and violence to protest against the orders, but in general there are noticeably fewer women in the streets than before the Taliban took power in August 2021.

The order on women covering their faces came from the Taliban's ministry for the promotion of virtue and prevention of vice. This ministry and its morality police became notorious during the Taliban's 1990s rule for their strict discipline on issues like women not being able to leave the home without a chaperone, or men being forced to grow beards.

The ministry is again on the rise diplomats say, and last week moved into new government offices which once housed Afghanistan's senators. Its enforcers are again on the lookout for what they see as infractions.

Mohammad Sadiq Akif, spokesman for the ministry, says its orders have come from God.

“People who say the face need not be covered are wrong,” he told the Telegraph. “According to Islamic law, hijab should cover the whole body including the face.”

He said he did not care about other Muslim countries that do not cover women's faces.

“We don't have any responsibility for ordering other countries. We do what God and the Prophet Mohammed ordered us to do. We don't care about other people.”

Some Taliban officials have said the order is only advisory, and some women do not cover their faces in the street even after the edict. 

Recent research by the Afghanistan Analysts Network found widespread variation across the country in how women were adapting to the new rule and whether local Taliban officials were enforcing it. But for high-profile female television journalists, the ministry has been strict.

Day by day Ms Yousofi feels more restricted. She wonders how much longer she can continue her job. Her family tell her that her life is more important than a job.

“I really had a dream and a very, very big plan to make significant progress in journalism, but with such circumstances, it is impossible,” she says.

“All dreams remain just a dream, and it really affects me, it is even impossible to continue working. I'm so angry that I can not continue to work as before. We are convicted of being women.”

Vice and virtue

When the Taliban re-took power in August 2021, there were few more powerful signs that they remained unchanged from their first incarnation than the revival of their most notorious ministry.

The Ministry for Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice symbolised the worst of the Taliban's austere restrictions during their 1990s reign. For many Afghans the ministry typified the Taliban's joyless and repressive government and its return was ominous.

As if to underline their desire to scrap the reforms of Ashraf Ghani's internationally-backed government, the Taliban handed over the women’s ministry building to be the new home of the vice and virtue enforcers.

Mohammad Sadiq Akif, spokesman for the ministry, says its job is to keep Afghanistan safe and it is following orders from God.

“We ban illegal things that are not in our religion, because we want to keep safe our society from forbidden things,” he says.

The ministry's most infamous edict has been to order women to cover their faces, preferably using the burqa. Women are also banned from travelling more than 48 miles (78km) without being chaperoned by a male guardian.

“It's good to have someone with a woman. Woman are weak. Maybe something will happen to her on the road. Islamic law is thinking of her safety,” he says.

The ministry's rulings not only affect women. Mr Akif says recorded music has been banned, only live music is allowed. He says taped music has been disrupting people's prayers and interrupting funerals.

During an interview with the Telegraph, Mr Akif was interrupted by a phone call from a member of the public he said was complaining about neighbours' loud music. “You see Afghans want this,” he claimed.

The rules in the restored emirate are still not as severe as they were in the 1990s, but they are heading that way.

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