Taliban orders women to wear burkas to access hospitals, MSF says
Medical charity Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) said Taliban authorities in Afghanistan ordered female patients, caregivers and staff to wear burqas (a purely Islamic veil) when entering public health facilities in the western city of Herat.
MSF said the restrictions will come into force from 5 November.
“These restrictions further disrupt women’s lives and limit women’s access to healthcare,” Sarah Chateau, the agency’s program manager in Afghanistan, told the BBC. Even “those in need of urgent medical care” were affected, he said.
Taliban government spokesman denied MSF’s account. Reports say restrictions have been partially relaxed since the alert was raised.
MSF, which supports pediatric services at Herat Regional Hospital, said it observed a 28% drop in admissions of urgent patients in the first few days of the new implementation.
Ms. Chateau said Taliban members stood at the entrance to health facilities, preventing women without burqas from entering. A burqa is a one-piece veil that covers the face and body, often leaving only a screen to see through.
A Taliban spokesman for the Ministry of Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Evil, which enforces strict religious doctrines, denied reports that women were being forced to wear burqas.
Saif al-Islam Hayber said, “This is completely wrong. The attitude of the Ministry of Morality and Virtue is generally about wearing the headscarf.”
Although hijab generally means covering, it also describes the headscarf worn by Muslim women.
The Taliban official also denied reports that women were banned from medical centers because they were not wearing burqas.
At the same time, the Taliban official said: “The hijab is interpreted differently in different parts of the country, and many of these conflict with sharia [law]”
Activists also alleged that Taliban guards required women to wear burqas when entering key facilities last week.
A female activist from Herat province told the BBC that the dress code applies to those wishing to enter hospitals, schools and government offices.
The Taliban’s decision to impose burqas in Herat was also criticized on social media.
An Afghan activist posted a video on X showing some women setting clothes on fire to protest Taliban rule. The BBC has not independently verified the video.
The Taliban made the burqa mandatory when they first came to power in the 1990s.
Since taking power in August 2021, the Taliban government has implemented numerous restrictions, especially for women, in line with their interpretation of Islamic sharia law.
In 2022, the Taliban issued a decree ordering women to wear an all-encompassing Islamic face veil in public. Taliban officials later described the veil edict as “recommendation”.
Chateau said, “Although the veiling regulation was announced before, we are witnessing the application of burqa for the first time in Herat. In the last few days, more and more women are coming to the hospital wearing burqas.”
Since returning to power, the Taliban has banned women from most workplaces and universities and girls from secondary schools. The UN has repeatedly called on the Taliban to end what it describes as “gender discrimination.”
Last week, the UN announced that it had suspended operations at an important border crossing between Afghanistan and Iran due to restrictions on Afghan female personnel working on the border.
Islam Qala in Herat province became the main transit point for hundreds of thousands of Afghans who were forced to leave Iran last year.
