The people of Afghanistan experienced worsening levels of human rights violations under the de facto Taliban authorities. Women and girls faced the crime against humanity of gender persecution and were increasingly deprived of their rights to freedom of movement and freedom of expression. Access to healthcare remained difficult, and education for women and girls beyond primary school remained banned. The Shia-Hazara community continued to face targeted attacks and killings, primarily by the Islamic State of Khorasan Province (IS-KP). The Taliban continued to marginalize women as well as ethnic and religious groups from political participation, access to public services and humanitarian assistance.

The Taliban’s arbitrary arrests, forcible disappearances, torture and other ill-treatment and extrajudicial executions of former government employees, human rights defenders, journalists and critical voices continued. The Taliban continued to attack and arrest journalists and restricted media freedom. Hundreds of prisoners were reportedly sentenced to death.

The UN and the international community failed to address impunity for ongoing and past atrocities. Despite a deepening humanitarian and human rights crisis, Afghan refugees were forcibly returned to Afghanistan in large groups.

Background

The Taliban continued to be in de facto control since the then-government collapsed in August 2021 amid the withdrawal of US and NATO forces. The Taliban annulled the constitution and laws that existed prior to their takeover. Many Taliban leaders faced travel bans as they are sanctioned by the UN Security Council.

In June the UN reported that flash floods in the provinces of Baghlan, Badakhshan and Ghor claimed nearly 350 lives, destroyed or damaged more than 7,800 homes and displaced more than 5,000 families. Thirty-two out of 34 provinces were affected by flash floods, which UNICEF claimed were “hallmarks of the intensifying climate crisis”.

Women’s and girls’ rights

The Taliban continued expanding their draconian restrictions on women and girls. In May, they announced salary cuts for women who had been banned from working for the state but remained on the payroll, reducing their pay to AFN 5,000 (USD 70) per month. Mid-year, the Taliban promulgated a “vice and virtue law” banning women’s voices from being heard in public and preventing women without mahram (male chaperones) from using transport. Under this repressive law, the Taliban “morality inspectors” (police) were empowered to threaten and detain individuals who violate their morality code and bring them before the Taliban’s courts for prosecution.

Severe restrictions remained in place – despite the April 2023 UN Security Council resolution calling for their swift reversal – and continued to impact all aspects of women’s and girls’ lives. Women and girls remained banned from attending education beyond primary school (grade six). In December, it was additionally reported that the Taliban banned women and girls from attending medical education. They remained banned from participating in sporting activities, visiting parks and public baths, and travelling more than 72km or appearing in public without mahram.

The Taliban’s draconian restrictions further decimated women’s financial independence, plunging women-headed households deep into poverty and creating difficulties for women running home-based businesses. Bans remained on women working in the public sector, except in areas such as primary education, healthcare and certain security institutions. The Taliban’s decision banning women from working with UN agencies and NGOs remained unchanged.

Due to restrictions on freedom of peaceful assembly, Afghan Witness, an independent research team, reported that 94% of all women’s protests “took place indoors”.

Gender-based violence

In August the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Afghanistan reported cases of women detainees being sexually abused and assaulted by the Taliban. Similarly, Afghan Witness and the media reported that the Taliban initiated a campaign in January to arrest women and girls for non-compliance with mandatory hijab rules. This resulted in the arrest and detention of dozens of women and girls during the year, “with many reporting degrading treatments, torture, and even rape”.

There were continued reports of a sharp increase in gender-based violence as well as forced and early marriage. Between January 2022 and June 2024, Afghan Witness recorded 840 incidents of gender-based violence against women and girls, including 332 killings, based on their monitoring of open-source information. Impunity continued as the institutions and legal framework designed to address gender-based violence remained dismantled by the Taliban.

In June, Amnesty International joined calls led by Afghan women human rights defenders to recognize gender apartheid as a crime under international law.¹ However, Afghan women human rights defenders were excluded from the third UN-convened meeting on Afghanistan in Qatar on 30 June and 1 July.²

In September, Germany, Australia, Canada and the Netherlands announced legal action before the International Court of Justice against the state of Afghanistan for violations of CEDAW by the Taliban de facto authorities.³

Right to truth, justice and reparation

The Taliban announced in August that they would no longer allow the UN Special Rapporteur on Afghanistan to enter the country. In September the UN Human Rights Council’s resolution on Afghanistan extended the vital mandate of the UN Special Rapporteur and acknowledged serious accountability gaps. However, it failed to establish an independent international accountability mechanism to investigate and to collect and preserve evidence of ongoing and past crimes under international law and other serious human rights violations. Ninety national and international human rights organizations, including Amnesty International, had called for such a mechanism to address the cycle of impunity in the country.⁴ In August a group of UN Special Procedures mandate holders highlighted that an avenue for access to justice was “virtually non-existent” in Afghanistan.

The ICC investigation of the situation in the country remained slow and limited in scope. It excluded members of US and other international forces involved in the conflict before 2021, as well as members of the former Afghan government.⁵

Unlawful attacks and killings

Shia-Hazaras were systematically targeted in attacks and killings at their places of worship, education and civilian locations across the country. The Islamic State of Khorasan Province (IS-KP) claimed responsibility for most of these attacks. The UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) documented several attacks in a Hazara-dominated area, west of the capital, Kabul between January and March. In September, 14 Hazara travellers were unlawfully killed in central Afghanistan.

IS-KP suicide attacks also targeted members of the Taliban de facto authorities, causing civilian casualties. Civilians continued to be harmed by landmines and other explosive remnants from the previous conflict. UNAMA reported civilian injuries and deaths in March, resulting from aerial strikes by the Pakistan army and ground engagement between the Taliban and Pakistan’s military forces along the border.

Enforced disappearances, arbitrary arrests and detentions

As of June, 20,000 people, including 1,500 women, were reportedly imprisoned under the Taliban.

The Taliban continued using arbitrary arrests, enforced disappearances and unlawful detention against people perceived as political opponents. These included former government employees, religious scholars who criticized the Taliban’s policies, civil society activists and human rights defenders and many journalists. For example, the Afghan human rights organization Rawadari recorded 614 cases of arbitrary detention in the first six months of the year. The organization further reported that it had documented 35 cases of enforced disappearance from nine of the country’s 34 provinces in the same period.

In August the Taliban Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (MPVPV, also known as the morality inspectors or police) announced that they had detained 13,000 people over the past year for violating their morality rules. Ahmad Fahim Azimi, an education rights activist, was released in September after 11 months’ imprisonment, following arbitrary arrest and an unfair trial in which he was accused of organizing protests and “inciting women to protest”.

Extrajudicial executions, torture and other ill-treatment

Detainees, including members of the former government and those critical of the Taliban, remained at risk of torture and other ill-treatment and extrajudicial executions. UNAMA recorded at least 98 cases of arbitrary arrest and detention of former government employees between January and June, including 20 incidents involving torture and other ill-treatment and nine incidents of unlawful killings.

The Taliban’s use of public corporal punishment, amounting to torture and other ill-treatment, continued across the country. UNAMA reported punishments taking place in at least one province each week. From April to June, UNAMA recorded 179 individuals (147 men, 28 women and four boys) sentenced to corporal punishments. Accusations included “adultery” and “running away” – which disproportionately affected women and girls – and pederasty.

UNAMA also documented at least 1,033 instances of unlawful use of force (205 on women and girls and 828 on men and boys) by members of the MPVPV between August 2021 and March 2024.

Death penalty

The Taliban continued to carry out public executions of individuals who had been sentenced to death by their courts, despite serious concerns regarding compliance with fair trial rights.⁶ UNAMA reported that three men were publicly executed in February and one man in November. In July, reports further indicated that between 300 and 600 prisoners were sentenced to death by the Taliban courts. In March, media reported that the Taliban may resume “stoning to death” as punishment for “adultery”.

Freedom of expression

The Taliban relentlessly suppressed freedom of expression by banning media outlets from operating and restricting their programming. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) ranked Afghanistan among the three worst countries for media freedom in 2024. In April, at least two local private TV stations (Noor and Barya) were suspended for criticizing the Taliban. In May, RSF raised concerns that journalists and analysts were prohibited from working for and collaborating with Afghanistan International, a popular TV news channel operating outside the country.

The Taliban also reportedly introduced restrictions on live political talk shows, including limitations on who could participate in interviews and what they could say. In October, media reported that the Taliban in Takhar province had banned filming and broadcasting “living things”, as it is against their vice and virtue law. In November, UNAMA reported the use of arbitrary arrest, torture and other ill-treatment, and threats and intimidation against 336 journalists and media workers between August 2021 and September 2024.

Freedom of religion and belief

The Taliban’s restrictions on Shia jurisprudence being taught in the education system remained in place. The Taliban promulgated decrees and laws which instituted religious discrimination and implemented monolithic religious doctrine. There were reports of the Taliban forcing members of the Shia Islamic community to convert their religious sect to the Sunni faction of Islam. The Taliban restrictions on the Ashura commemoration, which is mainly observed by Shia communities, continued. Additionally, the Taliban called Nawroz (solar new year celebrations) “un-Islamic”.

Economic, social and cultural rights

Poverty, which was exacerbated after the Taliban takeover in 2021, deepened in response to extreme weather events and ongoing internal displacement and economic crisis. UNDP reported that about 85% of Afghans lived on less than one dollar a day. According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, 23.7 million people, more half the country’s population, needed humanitarian assistance. Of those, 12 million people were food insecure, while 2.9 million experienced emergency levels of hunger. UNICEF estimated that 2.9 million children faced acute malnutrition in 2024, with 850,000 experiencing life-threatening malnutrition. The humanitarian assistance programme remained severely underfunded.

Rawadari reported that the Taliban intentionally deprived marginalized religious and ethnic groups of humanitarian and development assistance, as well as access to essential services and government jobs.

The International Organization for Migration (IOM) warned of “a near-collapse of the national public health system”, with the EU warning that “basic health services are available to just 10% of women”. UNAMA warned that restrictions on access to contraception violated women and girls’ right to sexual and reproductive health.

People continued to flee the country in large numbers, both due to the worsening humanitarian crises and the draconian Taliban restrictions. Meanwhile, countries in the region, including Iran, Pakistan and Türkiye, continued to forcibly return hundreds of thousands of Afghan refugees. These added to the 1.1 to 1.3 million who the IOM reported had already been returned in 2023. Some European countries also returned Afghan refugees back to the country.

LGBTI people’s rights

LGBTI people continued to face discrimination and other human rights violations, including threats and arbitrary detention. Same-sex consensual relations remained illegal and punishable by death.

1. “Global: Gender apartheid must be recognized as a crime under international law”, 17 June ↩︎
2. “Global: UN-hosted Doha meeting on Afghanistan faces a credibility test”, 21 June ↩︎
3. “Afghanistan: International legal initiative an important step toward tackling the Taliban’s war on women”, 26 September ↩︎
4. “Afghanistan: Meaningful action needed at UN Human Rights Council to advance accountability for past and ongoing crimes under international law in Afghanistan”, 26 September ↩︎
5. Afghanistan: Amnesty International Calls for the Urgent Establishment of an Independent International Accountability Mechanism for Afghanistan, 18 September ↩︎
6. “Afghanistan: Taliban must halt all executions and abolish death penalty”, 23 February ↩︎