International Women’s Day – March 8
Empowering Afghan Women – A Success Story

By Ambassador Eduardo Aguirre

Today is International Women’s Day, a day when we celebrate the achievements of women throughout the world and recommit ourselves to working to ensure that the girls of today will enjoy a future of opportunity. On this day, I want to honor the Afghan Woman and her return to being an equal and active participant in that society.
When the Taliban took over the capital city of Kabul in September 1996, it issued several edicts that stripped women and girls of their rights. The edicts forbade women and girls to work or receive an education. Fortunately, much has changed since then…

Over the past five years, the strides made by the women of Afghanistan have been enormous. Under the Taliban, women were barred from public office. Today, Afghanistan's parliament includes 91 women -- and President Karzai has appointed the first woman to serve as a provincial governor. Today, more 2 million girls attend school.

Afghan women work as entrepreneurs and educators, as farmers and freedom activists. They're lawyers and literacy advocates, college graduates and community health workers. Women are now reclaiming their place with men at the center of Afghan society.

Americans care deeply about their sisters, the women of Afghanistan. One way we’re helping is through the U.S.-Afghan Women’s Council, which President Bush and President Karzai launched in January 2002. The Council brings together the governments of Afghanistan and the United States -- and organizations from across the private sector -- to ensure that Afghan women can participate in the political, economic, and civil life of their country.

Council initiatives benefit citizens throughout Afghanistan. Women judges and lawyers are being educated about Afghanistan's new constitution and civil rights. Hundreds of midwives are being trained to help reduce the country’s high maternal mortality rate.

Council initiatives improve economic opportunities for Afghan women. Microcredit loans have been extended to Afghan entrepreneurs, and Afghan women have attended graduate-level business seminars in the United States. One Council program, Arzu, Inc., sells traditional rugs woven by Afghan women, giving them a job so they can support themselves and their families.

We all know, though, the importance of getting an education. And, the Council is also committed to improving education for all the people of Afghanistan. At the Women’s Teacher Training Institute in Kabul, established by the Council in partnership with the government of Afghanistan and USAID, women can come to study to be teachers, and they have a safe dormitory in which to stay during training. They in turn return home to train more teachers, with the goal of getting as many trained teachers into schools all over Afghanistan as soon as possible.

The Council also supports a program at the University of Nebraska, Omaha, that brings Afghan teachers to the United States, to the University of Nebraska to participate in the Afghanistan Teacher Education Project, which helps teachers develop their English language and computer skills. By the end of this year, more than 100 alumni of the program will have trained hundreds of local teachers at workshops throughout Afghanistan.

The Council will continue to work to improve the lives of even more women in Afghanistan -- women like Hasina Mojadidi. Hasina was a university student in Kabul when she was forced to abandon her education. For years she was house-bound, prohibited from reading even the most simple newspaper articles or books. Hasina says that during those long years, she missed reading so much that she would collect whatever scraps of newspaper or package-wrapping came into her home, just so she could look at the words printed across them. When the prohibition was lifted against women's education, Hasina reenrolled in the university. She earned a degree in literature. Today she's a director of Afghanistan’s “Learning for Life” program, an initiative supported by the U.S.-Afghan Women’s Council as part of the Women’s Teacher Training Institute. Through “Learning for Life,” Hasina is helping rebuild her country by teaching other women how to read.

There are many, many other examples of the good work being done by the United States to ensure that the women of Afghanistan live up to their potential. Two more come to mind…A USAID sponsored bakery in West Kabul employs 12 women and provides them with a reliable income. Another example is how 5,000 girls walked through the doors of the newly renovated Sultana Razia Girls’ School after having been banned from the premises for six years.

In today's Afghanistan, people are free to speak their minds, they're free to begin to realize dreams – even the women. So, while much still remains to be done in Afghanistan to empower women, the United States is proud of the achievements of Afghan women and proud to have been a part of their emancipation.
 

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