A glimpse of life for women in Afghanistan under Taliban rule

‘NO WOMAN’S LAND’ has been awarded the prestigious 14th Carmignac Photojournalism Award and will be exhibited at the Réfectoire des Cordelieres in Paris this autumn.

A few months ago, pho­to­jour­nal­ist Kiana Hay­eri and researcher Mélis­sa Cor­net trav­elled to the Mawoud Acad­e­my school in Kab­ul. It was a heavy jour­ney – Hay­eri had pre­vi­ous­ly vis­it­ed the school under heart­break­ing cir­cum­stances. I first report­ed on it for the New York Times after it was attacked by a sui­cide bomber in Octo­ber 2022,” Hay­eri says. Then they were attacked one more time and we did a crowd­fun­der, so I was very involved with the school.”

The major­i­ty of its stu­dents are women and from the minor­i­ty Haz­ara com­mu­ni­ty, who have been fac­ing increased per­se­cu­tion and vio­lence as the Tal­iban have tight­ened their grip in Afghanistan. Despite the chal­lenges, the pair found a rebuilt and thriv­ing school and were greet­ed with warmth when they arrived. All these new stu­dents knew about my pres­ence,” she con­tin­ues. And they brought a cake – per­son­al­ly it touched me, it real­ly moved me.”

Kabul, Kabul, Afghanistan, February 17, 2024. A private institute in the West of Kabul, where girls follow the American curriculum in English, but cannot obtain any Afghan official education certificate, nor can they go to university in Afghanistan, which are closed for women. This is a rare instance where the school has managed to secure the local Taliban's approval to shut a blind eye on the school's operation with teenage girls.

It was a rare instance of joy for Hay­eri and Cor­net, with­in a land­scape where such moments are becom­ing hard­er to come by. The pair were trav­el­ling around Afghanistan as part of a six-month jour­ney to report on the chang­ing sit­u­a­tion for women in the coun­try since the Tal­iban had tak­en con­trol in 2021. Now, their project NO WOMAN’S LAND has been award­ed the 14th Carmi­gnac Pho­to­jour­nal­ism Award, with the project to be exhib­it­ed at the Réfec­toire des Corde­lieres in Paris from Octo­ber 25 until Novem­ber 18.

Both Hay­eri and Cor­net have been liv­ing and work­ing in Afghanistan for sev­er­al years. Cor­net first trav­elled to the coun­try in 2018 to research women’s rights in the coun­try while Hay­eri moved in 2014. When the Tal­iban seized con­trol of Kab­ul, and ulti­mate­ly the whole of the coun­try in August 2021, both Hay­eri and Cor­net left, before return­ing in the months after.

While con­duct­ing their project, the pair inter­viewed and pho­tographed over 100 women in sev­en dif­fer­ent provinces. In doing so, they illu­mi­nate per­son­al sto­ries of women from across Afghanistan’s diverse soci­ety, which is made up of a lay­ered and diverse fab­ric of expe­ri­ences. Afghanistan is mas­sive – it’s very dif­fer­ent region by region,” Cor­net explains. One thing that def­i­nite­ly has changed is that the war has come to an end, so there’s no active fight­ing. For women in some of the rur­al areas – say, Kan­da­har or Hel­mand where they saw heavy fight­ing over the last decade, they’re much more at peace.”

For oth­ers, it’s been a con­stant­ly evolv­ing pic­ture, with new decrees restrict­ing their abil­i­ty to move freely in pub­lic with­out male chap­er­ones. In 2022 the Tal­iban shut down schools and fur­ther edu­ca­tion estab­lish­ments for women above sixth grade. Most recent­ly, at the end of August, a new rule was announced ban­ning women’s bare faces and voic­es from being heard in public.

Yamit District, Badakhshan, Afghanistan, May 10, 2024. Kheshroo's daughter and her cousin, both grade 11 students who were put out of school, committed suicide a year before by throwing themselves in the water. The family plays in puddles of water, among troops of yaks, horses and goats, in front of the Wakhan mountains, Wakhan, a region that had never been controlled by the Taliban before 2021.

The year after the fall [of Kab­ul], in a weird way, things were not as bad as we thought they would have been,” Cor­net says. The Tal­iban were reas­sur­ing peo­ple that women would have their rights, and in that first year women were work­ing, going back to uni­ver­si­ty, school, and jour­nal­ists were work­ing pret­ty freely. It real­ly changed after the two-year anniversary.”

With each new decree, the sit­u­a­tion becomes increas­ing­ly hope­less and repress­ing. By the end of the project, the over­whelm­ing con­clu­sion was that [many women] have absolute­ly no hope that things are going to improve now unless they leave the coun­try or the Tal­iban leave,” says Cor­net. We spoke to a ther­a­pist and she was explain­ing how cas­es she has [seen] of anx­i­ety, OCD and sui­ci­dal ten­den­cies have skyrocketed.”

Despite this there are glimpses of small pock­ets of resilience, resis­tance and hope with­in the sto­ries and pic­tures from NO WOMAN’S LAND. The pair spoke to a group of teenage girls who would find savvy ways to meet up in pri­vate, while oth­ers are con­tin­u­ing to pro­vide edu­ca­tion. We vis­it­ed a cou­ple of under­ground schools,” says Hay­eri. Right now, even if they grad­u­ate there’s no uni­ver­si­ty and they can’t hold a job, but these under­ground schools carve some space for the girls to come out of their homes and keep their minds busy and learn something.”

Top to bottom: Gardi, Ghos district, Nangarhar, Afghanistan, February 13, 2024. In the absence of school buildings in Gardi Ghos District, classes are set up for students, between two main roads under the sun and on dirt ground; Aizabad, Badakhshan, Afghanistan | May, 11, 2024. A ripped poster shows how women are supposed to cover their faces: with a burqa, or chadari, a full face covering, or with a niqab, allowing only the eyes to be uncovered.

When Cor­net and Hay­eri revis­it­ed the Mawoud Acad­e­my they found a dynam­ic learn­ing envi­ron­ment, and a bea­con for opti­mism. Right now, this school has 700 female high school stu­dents, they go to school in day­light and they study the Amer­i­can cur­ricu­lum,” Hay­eri explains. The fundrais­er we did with the sto­ry years ago con­nect­ed them with a school in San Diego, which got involved with them and helped cre­ate the curriculum.

It was very joy­ful to see class­es packed, girls were keen, curi­ous – they were like sponges,” she con­tin­ues. The plan is that they’ll do the same exams that they do in Amer­i­ca and walk away with a diplo­ma, which will open many doors for them – that pro­vides some hope for us.”

Kabul, Kabul, Afghanistan, February 3, 2024. Girls playing in the snow in western Kabul behind an apartment block, off the main road. Since the takeover, women and girls' rights to move without a male chaperon or to go to parks have been curtailed, and very few opportunities to find joy in their daily lives remain.
Saydabad District, Wardak, Afghanistan, February 22, 2024. Saira, 50, poses in her home in front of the banners her sons obtained after graduating from madrassas in Pakistan. On the other wall, the large white flag of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan is attached. The province where she lives, Wardak, was very affected by the conflict. "People might have thought my sons are Talibs, so we used to fold these posters as pillows and sleep on them. Now they're on the walls. I'm very proud of them. Life after conflict is peaceful. In the past, we were running, our lives were running, but now we're calm, and peaceful, and quiet. I'm relaxed now, I can sleep peacefully at night. That's enough fighting. Now, we're very happy."
Kabul, Kabul, Afghanistan, February 29, 2024.Female journalists working in the office of a women-focused media platform. Since the Taliban came to power in August 2021, the Afghan media landscape has been decimated. According to Reporters Without Borders, in the three months following the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, 43% of Afghan media outlets disappeared. Since then, more than two-thirds of the 12,000 journalists in the country in 2021 have left the profession.
Kabul, Kabul, Afghanistan, March 2, 2024. A group of teenage girls celebrate their friend's birthday at her house. Music and dancing have been forbidden by the Taliban but women continue to dance and celebrate in the privacy of their homes and behind the closed doors.

NO WOMAN’S LAND by Mélis­sa Cor­net and Kiana Hay­eri will be on view at the Réfec­toire des Corde­lieres in Paris from Octo­ber 25 until Novem­ber 182024.

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