UN: Taliban Govern Afghanistan Through 470 Decrees, 79 Target Women

DID Press: UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reports that since regaining power, the Taliban has issued at least 470 decrees, 79 of which impose direct restrictions on women and girls. These measures have profoundly altered Afghanistan’s social and economic structures, keeping the country at the top of global humanitarian crises.

OCHA’s latest report highlights that Taliban policies against women have intensified this year, significantly affecting their access to education, employment, and public life. Women’s participation in the workforce has fallen to approximately 6 percent, with most confined to informal household activities. Female-headed households face severe obstacles in mobility, employment, and access to aid; 66 percent do not know how to obtain humanitarian services, and 79 percent experience shortages of food and safe water.

The UN agency warns that systematic exclusion of women from public life, combined with ongoing conflict, drought, food insecurity, and the return of migrants, exacerbates Afghanistan’s humanitarian crisis. Protection risks are escalating, with women and children facing gender-based violence, child marriage, child labor, trafficking, and psychological pressures. Reported cases of child marriage rose sharply to 746 in 2025, compared to 323 the previous year.

OCHA emphasizes that these restrictive decrees, alongside economic hardship and natural disasters, further endanger the safety and well-being of Afghanistan’s most vulnerable populations.