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www.oakvillebeaver.com The Oakville Beaver Weekend, Saturday April 26, 2008 - 3 Speaking up for the women of Afghanistan Sally Armstrong urges Canadians not to abandon Afghanistan By David Lea OAKVILLE BEAVER STAFF I magine losing your status as a person just because you're a woman and no one has the inclination to stand up to your oppressors. For Oakville native and journalist Sally Armstrong, imagining such degradation is not necessary as she bore witness to it first hand when she visited Afghanistan shortly after the Taliban took over in 1996. Armstrong, an Amnesty Award winner, member of the Order of Canada and contributing editor to Maclean's magazine, spoke about her experiences in Afghanistan to an audience of around 100 people at the Kensington Retirement Residence on Tuesday. The dominating message brought to light in her presentation was that the international community must not abandon the women of Afghanistan as they did in 1996. "The Taliban basically put those women under house arrest and they did it overnight and they did it with the most misogynistic edicts the world had ever known," said Armstrong. "Just like that girls can't go to school. Just like that women can't go to work and you can't leave your house unless you're dressed in a burka, which is like a body bag by the way, and you have to be in the company of your husband, brother or son." This was a very drastic change for the women of Afghanistan, who had been teachers, doctors, lawyers and nurses and as such Armstrong wanted to see how they were coping and how the Taliban were actually getting away with what they were doing. To this end Armstrong decided to journey into Afghanistan. Not an easy task. "As a journalist, you have to get to your story and these thugs certainly don't want you in the way and so they make it almost impossible for you to get in," said Armstrong. " I went to a Taliban administra- LIESA KORTMANN / OAKVILLE BEAVER DO THE RIGHT THING: Canadian journalist Sally Armstrong spoke to about 100 people at the Kensington Retirement Residence about her experiences in Afghanistan before and after Canada's military involvement. A long time advocate for the plight of Afghan women, Armstrong believes it would be a mistake to abandon the country to the Taliban. tor's office and said, `My name is Sally Armstrong, I'm Canadian, I'm a journalist, I need a visa.' The guy looked at me like I had six heads." The Taliban administrator informed Armstrong that she could not enter his country as she was not accompanied by a man, a situation that Armstrong promptly remedied by stepping outside and hiring a man to accompany her. A three-day paper chase followed after which Armstrong returned to the administrator's office to pick up her visa. "And then the guy started with me," said Armstrong. The administrator asked Armstrong if she knew the rules in his country. "I knew them better than he did, but I decided to keep my mouth shut. He said that it was un-Islamic to do this, it's un-Islamic to do that, which he was just making up. Then he said, `It is un-Islamic to take photos. Do you have a camera?'" Armstrong was in possession of a camera and, as she was in a room "The Taliban claim they were doing this in the name of God, but there isn't one word in the Koran to support what they did. There's no place in the Koran that says a woman can't go to work or a girl can't go to school, or any of that junk. These guys were making it up and they were getting away with it because no one was questioning it." Sally Armstrong with about seven Taliban armed with machine guns, she decided it was not the best time to lie and presented the camera to the administrator. The administrator examined the camera closely and then, for reasons known only to himself, decided to allow Armstrong to keep it due to its small size. While getting into Taliban controlled Afghanistan was strange enough, inside the country the laws had become even stranger. In their first few years in power the Taliban banned television, radio, singing, dancing, clapping, laughing, kite flying, makeup, high-heeled shoes and more. A woman wearing white socks could face death by stoning because the Taliban saw white socks as sexually suggestive. "A woman I met had been married a week before the Taliban came to town. She did what they said, this young girl. She had never owned a burka, but she went out and bought one. She didn't leave her house unless she was in the company of her new husband, but she had had a manicure for her wedding and she didn't take it off," said Armstrong. "When the Taliban saw her they splayed her fingers apart and they chopped off her finger tips. When I met her she had lost her mind. That's who was ruling this country while the world decided to look the other way." The degree to which the world was willing ignore what was happening in Afghanistan became clear to Armstrong during a visit to Kandahar City when she was being tailed by the Taliban who had grown uncomfortable with her in the country. Armstrong attempted to seek shelter in a United Nations building, but did not receive a very warm welcome. "The UN regional manager answered the door and he said, `When are you going to get it through your head? What's happening to the women of Afghanistan is cultural.'" Armstrong disagreed, but suggested this was a discussion best left for another time and asked for shelter. The UN manager shut the door and Armstrong was picked up by the Taliban minutes later and ordered to leave the country, which she did after concluding an interview with the governor of Kandahar. "What irked me almost more than being taken by the Taliban was the UN guy's attitude that this was cultural and that it was okay to do this to women," said Armstrong. "The Taliban claim they were doing this in the name of God, but there isn't one word in the Koran to support what they did. There's no place in the Koran that says a woman can't go to work or a girl can't go to school or any of that junk. These guys were making it up and they were getting away with it because no one was questioning it." In 2001 the international silence that had consented to the Taliban's conduct was broken as Canada, America, Britain and a host of other nations forced the regime from power. Not because of the horrible humanitarian outrages the Taliban had committed, but because they had chosen to harbour Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida in the wake to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Armstrong has returned to Afghanistan on numerous occasions to see how the country's women are doing now that the Taliban are not in control. She noted that despair and hope walk hand in hand as successes such as girls being allowed to go to school again are countered by the region's insecurity. See Taliban page 18 CALIFORNIA & PLANTATION SHUTTERS · Customer Satisfaction Guaranteed · Serving Oakville with Shop at Home Service · Wood & Vinyl Shutters, Supplied & Installed · High Quality at Affordable Prices Shop at Home Service Authorized Eclipse Shutters Dealer FREE SHUTTERS ETC. 905.691.4455 · www.shuttersetc.ca