KABUL: Afghan Taliban have rejected a United Nations (UN)’s demand to lift a ban on working women and those who intend to pursue education.
Taliban officials said that “the demand is tantamount to interfering in Afghanistan’s internal affairs.”
Suhail Shaheen, the head of the Taliban’s political office, questioned how the Doha meeting’s decision could be accepted or implemented when their representatives were not part of the talks held under the aegis of the UN in Qatar’s capital two days ago.
The Taliban’s response comes a day after a two-day meeting of the UN Security Council Taliban sanctions committee wrapped up in Doha without formally recognising the Taliban.
The Taliban had not been invited to the Doha meeting, which representatives of over 20 countries and global organisations attended.
“Another meeting would be held in the future,” United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said, citing the recently-concluded meeting as “important”.
When asked by a journalist if there would ever be a situation when he would meet the Taliban directly, Guterres, who chaired the meeting, said: “If the time is right, I would not deny the possibility.”
Representatives of France, China, Germany, India, Indonesia, Iran, Kazakhstan, Japan, Kyrgyzstan, Saudi Arabia, Norway, Pakistan, Qatar, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkey, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, United Arab Emirates, Britain, the United States, the EU and the Organisation of Islamic attended the Doha huddle.
A day earlier, Reuters reported that the committee had agreed to allow Amir Khan Muttaqi, the Taliban interim foreign minister, to meet with his Chinese and Pakistani counterparts in Islamabad.
Muttaqi will travel from Afghanistan to Pakistan next week for the meeting. The Afghan interim foreign minister has long remained under UN travel restrictions.
In a letter to the 15-member Security Council and the Taliban sanctions committee, Pakistan’s United Nations mission requested to exempt Muttaqi from travelling to Pakistan between May 6 and 9.
