Afghan-Iranian Taekwondo champion and women’s rights advocate Marzieh Hamidi spoke at UN Watch’s official side event at the 62nd session of the UN Human Rights Council, “Women’s Rights Under Extremism and Conflict,” calling on the international community to cease diplomatic normalization with the Taliban.
Prepared Remarks:
Ladies and Gentlemen,
I did not come to Geneva to ask for sympathy.
I came to ask for accountability.
Europe says it is fighting extremism. So why are the representatives of one of the most extremist regimes in the world being welcomed into diplomatic spaces?
Why are the victims of extremism forced into hiding while extremists are invited to meetings?
Why are Afghan women being told to be patient while the people who erased them from public life are treated as political actors?
Afghan women deserve answers.
Because let us be honest about what the Taliban are.
The Taliban are not misunderstood politicians. They are not reformers. They are not partners for progress. They are a regime that has erased women from public life, banned girls from education, stripped women of the right to work, to travel freely, and to participate in society, and turned discrimination against women into state policy.
I want Europe to hear this clearly.
You cannot claim to defend women’s rights while legitimizing those who destroy women’s rights.
You cannot claim to fight extremism while opening the door to extremists.
You cannot speak about freedom, democracy, and human dignity while sitting across the table from those who deny all three.
I am tired of the hypocrisy.
I am tired of hearing beautiful speeches about women’s rights while Afghan women are abandoned in reality.
I am tired of politicians hiding behind soft diplomatic language while millions of women are living under one of the most brutal systems of gender oppression in the world.
What is happening in Afghanistan is not a cultural difference. It is not a misunderstanding. It is not a complicated political situation.
It is oppression. It is persecution. It is gender apartheid.
And while we are sitting in this room today, women inside Afghanistan continue to pay the price.
Recently, in the city of Herat, women protesting for their rights were reportedly beaten, threatened, and violently suppressed.
Women continue to be detained and harassed simply for appearing in public.
Women have been arrested because they were not wearing the blue burqa demanded by Taliban authorities - even when they were fully covered.
Think about that.
Not because they committed a crime. Not because they harmed anyone. But because extremists decided that even a fully covered woman was still not covered enough.
This is not culture. This is not tradition. This is not religion. This is control.
Every single day, I receive messages from inside Afghanistan.
Messages from girls. Messages from mothers. Messages from students whose dreams have been stolen.
They tell me:
“Please be our voice.”
“Tell the world what is happening.”
“Do not let them forget us.”
And perhaps the most important message of all:
“The Taliban do not represent us.”
“The Taliban are not Afghanistan.”
“We do not want terrorists speaking in our name.”
So when governments invite the Taliban, they should remember something.
They are not inviting the voice of Afghan women. They are not inviting the voice of Afghan girls. They are not inviting the voice of the Afghan people.
They are inviting the people who silenced those voices.
I am not here to ask the world to speak for Afghan women. Afghan women are already speaking.
They are speaking through fear, through resistance, and through extraordinary courage.
The problem is not that Afghan women do not have a voice.
The problem is that too many people in positions of power have chosen not to listen.
And even worse, some have chosen to listen to the oppressors instead.
I am a young woman. I am an athlete. At 23 years old, I should be worrying about my next competition.
Instead, I have to worry about surviving threats from extremists who want to kill me because I believe women deserve freedom.
Extremism is not an abstract concept to me. It affects how I live, how I move, how I work, and how I plan my future.
Terrorists do not become legitimate because they are invited to conferences.
Oppression does not become acceptable because it is discussed politely.
Every invitation matters. Every diplomatic meeting matters. Every photograph matters.
Because every time the Taliban are treated as legitimate political actors without accountability, the message sent to Afghan women is devastating.
Your freedom can be negotiated.
Your dignity can be negotiated.
Your future can be negotiated.
I reject that message.
The women of Afghanistan do not need more empty statements.
They need courage. They need solidarity.
And they need the world to stop legitimizing those who are responsible for their oppression.
History will not ask how carefully we balanced our political interests.
