Introduction
In a groundbreaking move, Australia, Canada, Germany, and the Netherlands have announced their intention to take Afghanistan to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) over gender discrimination, following the Taliban’s brutal repression of women and girls. This would be the first time the ICJ has been used by a state to challenge another under the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women for gender discrimination. Since the Taliban seized control in August 2021, Afghan women and girls have faced what many activists, scholars, and policymakers are calling gender apartheid—a regime of systematic oppression that affects virtually every aspect of their lives.
The Taliban’s decrees have barred women from education beyond the sixth grade, mandated that they travel only with a mahram (male guardian), and imposed punishments for women who raise their voices in public. According to the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Afghanistan, Richard Bennett, these measures, coupled with increased surveillance by morality inspectors and restrictions on the media, represent “gender persecution, a crime against humanity,” that is reshaping Afghan society. The Taliban’s new vice and virtue laws, implemented in 2023, further entrench this system, with new rules that forbid women from leaving their homes unless fully covered and from engaging in public activities such as singing or raising their voices.