Women and the Struggle for Justice in Afghanistan

Afghanistan's parliament is expected to approve a reformed marriage law that removes some of the most oppressive wording of a previous law - essentially outlawing marital rape - but activists say there's a wide gulf between the meager improvements of the new law and its anticipated impact.

In March, Afghan President Hamid Karzai suspended a new marriage law when international critics argued that it legalized marital rape. The new law before parliament removes language that a woman must submit to sex every four days, but it still says a husband can legally withhold support if his wife refuses to “submit to her husband’s reasonable sexual enjoyment.’’ This is unacceptable, and our administration should be working with Karzai to grant women full, equal rights in marriage and to improve enforcement of laws against sexual assault.

With the expanded U.S. role in Afghanistan comes the responsibility to use our leverage in the country to urge an expansion of women's rights - both on paper and in enforcement. Take action here to urge President Obama and Congress to call for equal right's for women in Afghanistan.

Huffington Post on this week's new law:

Women's rights activists welcomed the new draft, but many said the government had not done enough and that little will change in day-to-day life.

"We need a change in customs, and this is just on paper. What is being practiced every day, in Kabul even, is worse than the laws," said Shukria Barakzai, a lawmaker and vocal women's rights advocate.

Even beyond the dispute over this law, the rights of women in Afghanistan are being ignored. A new report from the UN last week, entitled "Silence is Violence," urges the international community to play a role in ensuring improved women's rights in Afghanistan. From the report:

The current reality is that the lives of a large number of Afghan women are seriously compromised by violence. Women are denied their most fundamental human rights and risk further violence in the course of seeking justice for crimes perpetrated against them. Despite the hopes expressed nearly eight years ago, the rights and aspirations of Afghan women, and the men who support them, remain largely unfulfilled. The vast majority of Afghan women suffer a significant human rights deficit; for them, human rights are values, standards, and entitlements that exist only in theory and at times, not even on paper.

After the jump, watch a video from Brave New Films on the April law legalizing marital rape and the scant improvement in women's rights since the U.S. began fighting in Afghanistan.

Malalai Joya, a women's rights advocate who was suspended from Afghanistan's parliament for her outspoken criticism of fellow leaders, spoke with IPS news this week about the situation for women in the country.

The situation of women is like hell in most of the provinces.

It is true that in some big cities like Kabul, like Herat, Mazar-i-Sharif, some women have access to jobs and education but in most of the provinces, not only is there no justice at all -- even in the capital -- but in faraway provinces the situation of women is becoming more disastrous. The killing of women is like killing a bird today in Afghanistan.

The U.S. government lies and wants to pretend to the people around the world that for the first time they brought women’s rights to Afghanistan and that women do not wear burqas....In these past eight years, Afghan women haven't gained even the limited rights that they had in the 1970s and 1980s.

And, below, a video on the first draft of the marriage law in April and the failure of the U.S. to improve women's rights in Afghanistan through our involvement there.