What women face in Afghanistan is a crime against humanity, say activists pushing for recognition by UN

Explainer: What is gender apartheid – and can anything be done to stop it?

When Sima Samar and other Afghan women came up with the term “gender apartheid” in the 1990s to describe the systematic oppression faced by women and girls under Taliban rule, she never imagined it would have become a key weapon in the fight to hold a second Taliban regime to account for their crimes two decades later.

“When the first Taliban regime fell, the idea that we would once again see the persecution, isolation and segregational and systematic repression of half the Afghan population on the basis of their gender seemed impossible,” says Samar, who served as the minister for women’s affairs after the overthrow of the Taliban in 2001 and now lives in exile. “But now, in 2024, it is happening again and this time we must find a way to fight for justice.”