Afghan Woman Burns Taliban Official's Dummy To Protest Education Ban

In protest of the university ban imposed in Afghanistan, a viral video of a woman setting a dummy of a Taliban official on fire is making the rounds on social media.

The video shows a woman pouring inflammable liquid on the dummy of a Taliban official and setting it ablaze. The video was shared by Shabnam Nasimi, a former policy advisor to the Minister of Afghan Resettlement and Minister of Refugees. According to Nasimi, the woman in the video said that "I set fire to ignorance, but it is still alive and breathing. I am a girl from Afghanistan, and I want the world to hear me."

Afghan woman burns dummy Taliban official

Women have been barred from attending university in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan since last week. This ban had triggered a countrywide uproar, with both men and women condemning the ban.

A video from a TV show showing a professor tearing his diplomas on live television is now viral. He says that he does not accept this education if "his mother and sister can’t study."

Women have taken to the streets and braved water cannons in protest against the latest bans in Afghanistan. "What other choice do we have left? They have taken everything from us," said a woman protestor in Nangarhar.

Since the Taliban came back to power in 2021, women have continuously been robbed of their basic rights. Women have gradually been banned from having a public life. Women have been forced to leave their jobs or have been paid a fraction of their salary to stay at home. They have been prohibited from visiting parks, gyms, fairs, and public baths; from working in NGOs; and from travelling without a male relative. They have further been instructed to cover from head to toe in public, and girls have been banned from secondary schools in most of the country.

Suggested Reading: Why Afghan Men’s Solidarity For Women Banned From Education Matters