Our review of the documentary Afghans: in the clutches of the Taliban on France 5

. These words, Spalraï reads them to her adolescent students in a clandestine class installed at her home. This young woman is resisting in her own way the Taliban, whose oppression has spread throughout the country since the fall of Kabul on August 15, 2021 and their seizure of power. afghan womenthe unpublished documentary by Solène Chalvon-Fioriti, produced by Béatrice Schönberg, offers a striking dive into the daily life of women with very different profiles – educated or not, from cities or countryside – who try to survive and fight despite everything for their freedom and dignity

“Children are afraid of the Taliban”

“Children are afraid of the Taliban, adults, animals and even babies are afraid of them”confides Wawrina, 8, whose mother is the translator of Solène Chalvon-Fioriti. “I have known this little girl since she was born. I met his mother in 2011…for years I traveled the country with her. Shared sad or happy moments. But in recent months, since the return of the Taliban, my friend has changed. She is worried, constantly on the alert.explains the reporter who was able to film in Afghanistan until November 2022, when the masters of the country refused to renew her work visa.

Teenage girls educated clandestinely

The 34-year-old Frenchwoman’s camera follows little Wawrina in her school. We see her in class, wearing a white collared scarf that leaves her face uncovered. Her mistress has the obligation to be entirely veiled. “One day I cried because the Taliban came to school. They came to check that there were no overgrown girls among us., slips Wawrina. Three million adolescent girls over the age of 12 are deprived of education. A disaster when for twenty years – under the democratic regime supported by Westerners – the number of adolescent girls enrolled in secondary school had multiplied by five. Especially in cities. But in the ba*****t of the establishment frequented by Wawrina, about twenty young girls are attending school illegally. It is one of the 10,000 clandestine structures listed by Unicef. Like the one where Spalraï teaches.

Resistance through work

Women’s resistance is also confirmed in their desire to work. Like Arezo, a 30-year-old who runs a washable sanitary napkin factory. As no man works in this company, its activity continues. But when it came time to renew her business license, she had to be accompanied by her father. And if Arezo doesn’t take part in the protests of angry Afghan women that regularly take place in cities, she explains why: “I don’t want to endanger the future of my twenty employees. I want them to be able to continue to feed their families. And then my work is a struggle in itself. Massively forced into unemployment, the poorest Afghan women often fall into poverty. Like Jamaïl, 21 years old. This mother of six children, no longer able to do housework, had no choice but to sell three of her little girls. They will leave home at puberty…

Obliged to obey the religious police, the Afghan women who today can no longer circulate without being accompanied by a chaperone, are confronted with the restoration of corporal punishment. How can we not understand their bitterness, their feeling of having been betrayed and abandoned by the international community?

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