Women's Groups Call for UN Peacekeeping Force in Afghanistan

UNITED NATIONS - Women's rights supporters and faith leaders are calling for a United Nations peacekeeping force for Afghanistan to protect hard-won gains for women over the last two decades as American and NATO forces complete their pullout from the war-torn country and a Taliban offensive gains control over more territory.

Under the Taliban, women were not allowed to go to school, work outside the home or leave their house without a male escort. And though they still face many challenges in the country's male-dominated society, Afghan women have increasingly stepped into powerful positions in numerous fields — and many fear the departure of international troops and a Taliban takeover could take away their gains. In a May 14 letter obtained by The Associated Press, 140 civil society and faith leaders from the U.S., Afghanistan and other countries "dedicated to the education and rights of women in Afghanistan" asked U.S. President Joe Biden to call for a U.N. peacekeeping force "to ensure that the cost of U.S. military withdrawal from Afghanistan is not paid for in the lives of schoolgirls." The letter also asked the U.S. to increase humanitarian and development aid to Afghanistan "as an important security strategy" to strengthen women and girls and religious minorities like the Hazaras. Three bombings at a high school in a Hazara neighborhood in Kabul on May 8 killed nearly 100 people, all of them Hazara and most of them young girls just leaving class.