Womankind has been working with our Afghan partners to ensure we are raising Afghan women’s voices and keeping their issues visible. 

In November 2023, we funded three staff members from our Afghanistan partners Afghan Women Resource Centre (AWRC) and Women’s Regional Network (WRN) to participate in the ‘Shaping Feminist Foreign Policy Conference 2023’. Organised by the Government of the Netherlands at the World Forum in The Hague, the event aimed to shape Feminist Foreign Policy and to call attention to the need for additional funding for women’s rights organisations and movements.   

Our partners participated in more than five sessions and shared the challenges women in Afghanistan continue to face every day. AWRC and WRN being in the room, ensured that Afghan women’s voices remain heard in international conversations. It also meant that Afghan women in exile were able to meet other activists, policy makers and government officials. This is hugely significant within the context of travel restrictions and women being unable to participate in some Afghanistan-related policy spaces. Bringing Afghan women together in person is an important way of breaking the isolation that they are experiencing in exile.   

“Afghan women are just trying to find a space to raise their voices, tell the realities on the ground and repeatedly remind the world that we are still here.” Maryam Rahmani , Womankind’s Afghanistan Advisor 

WRN also had successes in launching their Community Conversations report ‘Afghan Women’s Struggle under the Taliban’. Womankind funded WRN’s research, writing and launch of this report. This feminist research documented the voices of over 1500 marginalised women in conflict zones, focused on the impact of Taliban rule on Afghan women within Afghanistan as well as those who have fled to India and Pakistan.  

The report was launched at the House of Lords on 7 December 2023 and presented to  UK government representatives. 

WRN also built advocacy momentum through launches in several other locations including in Canada and the United States during CSW68 in March 2024. Most recently, in June 2024 the report was presented at a panel discussion during the 56th Session of the United Nations Human Rights Council in Switzerland, at an event led by the Special Rapporteur on Afghanistan. Although this work wasn’t part of Womankind’s original planning for the year, it highlights the importance of responding to an extraordinary situation, as well as sustained effort to keep influencing the agenda on Afghan women’s rights. It shows the power of our adaptive and partner-centred approach in influencing the agenda.