AFGHANISTAN — Sitara* was already studying in a different country when the Taliban forcibly took control of Afghanistan in August 2021. Here she shares what life is like for the women who remain in Afghanistan.

*Name changed for security reasons.

Sitara* – Afghanistan Christian:

Taliban took Afghanistan and everything changed, like the days changed to nights for Afghan people.

Sitara was already studying in a different country when the Taliban forcibly took control of Afghanistan in August 2021.

Now she looks on from outside with great concern for her family and others who remain in her homeland.

Sitara*:

Every day, reading the news about Afghanistan and you are worried about your family there. And of course, before Taliban, my siblings were working in Kabul. But after that, they lost their jobs.

Every night I’m thinking about them, what will happen to them. Because last week, there was a bomb blast five minutes far from our home at Afghanistan.

When I heard this news, my heart was, my mind was kind of blasting that if my family member was there, what would happen to them, which hurts me every day, every second.

Satara is especially concerned about how the Taliban treats women and denies them an equal role in society.

Sitara*:

The world knows how Taliban are against women’s education and women working outside. They don’t want that women should be educated because they will give birth to educated children.

They will give the society educated children which is like maybe someday they will stand against Taliban. I came here in this country to study and go back to Afghanistan.

I had a lot of goals and dreams to do for my people, especially for women, because I have seen that how women are suffering inside Afghanistan. They don’t have as much rights that men have in Afghanistan.

So it was kind of my future goal to go to Afghanistan and do a, maybe do a kind of small, from a small business but now it seems that I can’t do it. It’s impossible because as far as Taliban are in Afghanistan it is impossible.

After she moved to her current country, Sitara* began to find out about Christianity and decided to convert. But she knows that her new faith in Jesus, as well as problems securing a visa, put her at great risk.

Sitara*:

Because we don’t have any Afghan embassy here and the world does not know or identify our government so they are not giving us a visa or they don’t give any rights as a student here to live in this country.

The problems that I suffer here, I don’t know for my tomorrow. Whenever I go out, I’m just afraid of police who can ask me “Where is your passport? Where is your visa?” So how can I answer to the police.

Of course they will take me and send me back to Afghanistan, which is – I think I can’t stay a single day in Afghanistan – which is impossible for me.

As everyone knows that in Afghanistan they accept only being Muslim. And Christians and other religions, they can’t live there. So of course, I can’t go back there.

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