Afghan Elections a Setback for Women

(NEWSER) - Afghan women streamed to the ballot boxes five years ago, and in some districts female turnout was even higher than male. But the flood of women voters that delighted aid groups dried up this year, reports the Washington Post, and many of the segregated female polling stations had few if any voters. More educated women who had voted before stayed home, while in more rural areas families kept mothers and daughters inside in the face of Taliban threats. More»

Intimidation campaign precedes tomorrow's vote

(NEWSER) - Taliban fighters have reportedly abducted more than 20 people in an intimidation campaign designed to derail tomorrow’s parliamentary elections, including at least two candidates. The Taliban also warned yesterday that anyone showing up to vote tomorrow “would get hurt.” NATO troops, meanwhile, have vowed to protect the election, and have already rescued three abducted Afghans in Ghazni province, Al Jazeera reports. More»

(NEWSER) - Hamid Karzai's battle for reelection on Thursday is facing a significant hurdle: threats by the Taliban to mutilate anyone who shows up at the polls. Insurgents are strongest in Pashtun regions, normally a Karzai stronghold, and in one town a group of Taliban fighters told citizens anyone who votes will have his finger chopped off. "We can't vote. Everybody knows it," one farmer told Dexter Filkins of the New York Times. More»

Militants suspected of striking again

(NEWSER) - About 150 Afghan girls were poisoned today after drinking the water at their Takhar province school, in what officials believe was a deliberate attack by Islamist militants opposed to educating girls. "We are 100% sure that the water they drunk … was poisoned," an education department spokesperson tells Reuters , speculating that it could be the work of "irresponsible armed individuals." More»

Karzai government not making progress, rights groups says

(NEWSER) - More than a decade after the Taliban regime was ousted, Afghanistan is still imprisoning hundreds of women for "moral crimes" like running away from their husbands, according to Human Rights Watch. The group interviewed scores of women in Afghan prisons, and found that many were there because they had attempted to flee abusive relationships or forced marriages, AP reports. Adultery is a crime in Afghanistan, and the women were often assumed to have cheated on their husbands. More»