Gordon Brown, the United Nations Special Envoy for Global Education, expressed confidence that the U.N. will move toward labeling the Taliban’s treatment of women and girls in Afghanistan as “gender apartheid.” Speaking at a press conference, Brown highlighted the increasing severity of restrictions placed on Afghan women since the Taliban’s return to power in 2021.
“There will be a meeting of the United Nations Legal Committee in October,” Brown announced. “It will be looking at this definition of gender apartheid. A decision may be made in October or later in the year, but I’m pretty confident that people now see what is happening in Afghanistan.”
Brown outlined the escalating nature of the Taliban’s repression, noting that Afghan women and girls are increasingly denied basic freedoms, from walking unchaperoned in public to accessing jobs in public service. “The restrictions on girls, and teenage girls in particular, have grown and grown,” he said. “So now they cannot walk freely in the streets without chaperones. Now, at the same time, they are denied jobs in the public services. And now, of course, a lot of the freedom to speak, even in public, is diminished.”
The former British prime minister argued that this systematic repression amounts to a form of apartheid based on gender, a term that the U.N. may officially adopt after the committee’s deliberations. “I’m pretty confident that the United Nations Legal Committee will recognize this,” Brown added.
The potential designation of the Taliban’s actions as “gender apartheid” would mark a significant development in international efforts to hold Afghanistan’s rulers accountable for their policies, which have stripped women and girls of education and basic civil liberties.
