Taliban issues decree banning female aid organization workers

Dec. 24 (UPI) -- The Taliban government of Afghanistan decreed on Saturday that all female employees of non-governmental aid organizations be barred from working in the country.

The decision was announced in a letter from the Taliban-controlled Ministry of Economy to national and international NGOs across the country, CNN and the BBC reported.

It comes less than a week after the government barred women from public and private universities. That ban was announced Tuesday in a letter from the Taliban-controlled Higher Education Ministry.

The NGO ban could severely impact access to basic supplies, advocates warned, asserting that women are necessary for aid deliveries due to the Taliban's strict interpretation of Islamic law which prevents men and women from interacting in most situations.

"The latest order by Taliban's Ministry of Economy suspending all female employees of national and international NGOs in Afghanistan is yet another deplorable attempt to erase women from the political, social and economic spaces," Amnesty International South Asia said in tweet.

Since the Taliban takeover from the western-backed Afghan government last year, the country has faced a massive economic crisis that critics contend is being worsened by the U.S. government's unwillingness to release funds belonging to the prior government.

In September the United States set up a fund to distribute frozen assets to programs designed to help Afghan civilians without going through the Taliban.

Biden administration officials said releasing some funds to Afghanistan's central bank would require guarantees that the funds would not be misappropriated or used to back terroristic activities.