Le donne del CISDA sono attive nella promozione di progetti di solidarietà a favore delle donne afghane sin dal 1999. Il primo incontro con le donne di RAWA e di HAWCA è avvenuto all’ARCI Isolotto di Firenze e, in seguito, all’ONU dei Popoli di Perugia a cui vennero invitate dalle “Donne in Nero”.
Da allora, questo nucleo di donne ha continuato la sua attività, collaborando anche con altre associazioni e attiviste afghane.
Dal 2014, su sollecitazione delle compagne e dei compagni afghani, l’attività di sostegno e informazione del CISDA si è rivolta anche alla resistenza curda.
Le finalità del CISDA si collocano nell’ambito della solidarietà sociale, della formazione, della promozione della cultura, della tutela dei diritti civili e dei diritti delle donne in Italia e all’estero.
L’Associazione ha come fondamento la condivisione dei valori umani di ogni persona quali ne siano religione, origine, cultura e nazionalità; lo scopo prioritario è la promozione di iniziative di carattere politico-sociale sia a livello nazionale che internazionale, sulla condizione delle donne che si trovano in situazioni svantaggiate dal punto di vista familiare, economico, sociale e politico, con particolare riferimento alle donne afghane.
All’interno del tessuto sociale CISDA intende, promuovendo la diffusione di una cultura e di una prassi di solidarietà:
contribuire al superamento di atteggiamenti emarginanti, con l’apertura all’accoglienza e alla condivisione e per l’educazione a una convivenza sociale multirazziale, in spirito di fraternità e di non violenza;
favorire l’eliminazione dei fattori che ostacolano il pieno e libero sviluppo umano, sociale ed economico
realizzare una crescita e uno sviluppo, sia a livello locale che internazionale, nella ricerca di una maggiore giustizia tra i popoli, nel rispetto del razionale sfruttamento delle risorse e dei limiti ambientali del pianeta
Pretending it’s a normal thing: that’s how you accept and make others accept what once seemed abominable. Just don’t talk about it, don’t mention it, talk about something else.
Talking about banks, drugs, aid… “normal”, everyday things of life, thus making people forget the daily horror experienced by women in Afghanistan under the fanatic regime of the Taliban and their ideology, so extreme and aberrant that even other extremist regimes suggest a limit. Afghanistan has disappeared from the news and international politics; no one talks about it anymore, unlike after the Taliban took power when “donor” countries lamented the tragic situation of the starving people and enslaved women, giving away money and scandalized words, as they did during the twenty years of occupation when they supported governments so incapable and corrupt that they lacked credibility even for themselves.
The distracted moral condemnation and fake economic sanctions imposed on the Taliban government – every month the UN sends $40 million to Afghanistan – have not softened the cruel laws against women, and the UN today declares concern for the crimes against women and their resistance only to then push forward the urgent need to help the population and fight drug trafficking. Efforts are being made to get the Taliban to engage in dialogue with the so-called international community and ensure that Western interests in Afghanistan continue to be protected.
The Taliban ask and the UN consents
In this context, the III Doha Conference took place in recent days, an international meeting that marked a turning point in Western policies towards that country: organized by the UN to normalize relations with the de facto government of Afghanistan and officially reopen economic and political relations with Western economies, which in reality had never been interrupted for some countries like China, India, Central Asia, Russia, Iran.
The novelty was the direct participation of the Taliban, who had not agreed to participate in the two previous Doha Conferences, thanks to the acceptance of their conditions, previously always excluded, which imposed inviting only them as representatives of the Afghan people and not addressing the issue of the oppression and systematic exclusion of women from education and society.
Humiliating conditions, not only for Afghan women but also for the entire democratic international community, but accepted by the UN and all participating states (albeit with Canada’s dissent). Acceptance highly criticized by various Afghan women’s associations, human rights organizations like Amnesty, and even Richard Bennett, the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in Afghanistan (who did not attend the meeting), costing the UN significant credibility regarding its role as a defender of human rights. Even the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) expressed deep concern over the exclusion of women and girls from the Doha meeting.
The “first time” for the Taliban… a step towards recognition
Apparently, this conference did not produce significant results. There were no enthusiastic official comments at the conclusion of the meeting, no triumphal tones. Rosemary DiCarlo, UN Under-Secretary-General for Political and Peace Affairs, who chaired the meeting on behalf of the UN, held her press conference in a subdued tone, almost quietly.
She highlighted that there was no official recognition of the de facto government, that sanctions were not lifted, and thus the Taliban did not get what they asked for. She also stated that she had supported women’s rights in every way, both directly in talks with the Taliban and through meetings, held after the meeting concluded, with women who agreed to speak with her (some refused in protest), but without any results.
One might say the meeting ended with nothing achieved, as neither did the Taliban obtain international recognition of their government and the lifting of international sanctions, nor did the UN achieve the easing of decrees against women’s rights.
But instead, an important result was achieved: it is precisely what DiCarlo called, satisfied and proud, “the first time” for the Taliban, their first official contact with the UN, promising it will be just the beginning…
The real success, however, is all the Taliban’s, consisting precisely in being admitted to a meeting with the UN for the first time and on their terms, which the UN accepted just to have them in Doha, overlooking the apartheid suffered by women and so stigmatized by the UN itself. This “first time”, so opposed by women and human rights activists, represented a success even before the conference took place, for the very fact of being desired and sought by the UN.
While the UN sells out their rights, women in Afghanistan are even more oppressed
Bennett had well expressed the sentiment of all opponents of the de facto government of Afghanistan and women’s organizations, declaring that renouncing their rights was too high a price to pay in exchange for normalizing relations with the Taliban and entering the so-called international community.
Another important reflection of this international visibility that the Taliban have gained by sitting at the UN table on their terms is all internal. Women who resist and continue to protest at the risk of their lives will now be even more harshly repressed thanks to a de facto legitimacy that the international community has given to those who devastate the rights of women and their people.
But how does the UN justify this sale of women’s rights?
DiCarlo explained that unfortunately, the Taliban do not want to sit at the negotiating table if women are present, so the UN was forced to leave them out the door.
This phrase, which makes this choice seem like an act of realism, actually takes for granted the international community’s defeat in defending Afghan women, showing that they have already surrendered to the Taliban’s will, seeing no alternatives.
The real message emerging from Doha3 is to take for granted that the Taliban control the country and to recognize, in fact, their government, even if officially denied.
The UN justifies this with the need to promote Afghanistan’s economic development to help the starving population, as if merely dialoguing with the Taliban could convince them to start a “normal” governance process based on the people’s needs rather than sharia’s.
But the facts are not taken into account: all the aid sent to Afghanistan so far has been intercepted and extorted by the Taliban for the benefit of the state apparatus and their loyal officials while little or nothing has reached the intended recipients, demonstrating how little the Taliban government cares about the well-being of its people. It was evident, for example, how they behaved during earthquakes and floods that destroyed entire territories and took everything from the already exhausted population: as numerous sources reported, aid was null or delayed because the Taliban logic is to consider catastrophes as natural phenomena sent by God and therefore to be accepted as fate.
Can opening a dialogue with the Taliban really be enough to influence them to change their fundamentalist and theocratic vision and adopt a secular governance?
The frozen money by the US and European countries belongs to the Afghans, NOT the Taliban
The money of the Afghan Central Bank frozen by the US and European countries (about $9 billion), which the UN and various organizations (including Italian ones) are asking to be unfrozen, could certainly serve to give oxygen to a population exhausted by wars and misery, but handing these funds over to the Taliban would mean giving them to despots who only care about maintaining their apparatus and loyal supporters and who extort the population with levies, taxes, and blackmail (as well demonstrated by the report “Corruption And Kleptocracy In Afghanistan Under The Taliban”).
More direct forms of support to the population must be found, and the Taliban government must be hit for its responsibility in imposing a system of oppression on the entire population and gender apartheid on women.
It is one of the most active and successful independent Afghan women’s organizations in the social field both in Afghanistan and Pakistan among Afghan refugees.
RAWA is also very active in the political sphere with its fight against fundamentalism and religious obscurantism, publicly denouncing the warlords who are still in high government positions and the responsibilities of the USA and the West in having built, financed and legitimized regimes based on the violation of women’s rights, ignoring and suppressing any democratic opposition movement.
Since its inception, CISDA has supported the political and social work of the association by organizing delegations to Afghanistan, meetings to raise awareness and knowledge of the Afghan reality with RAWA representatives throughout Italy and fundraisers.
It is one of the most accredited Afghan non-governmental organizations.
It encourages the active participation of women and young people in reconstruction processes and works in collaboration with institutions and organizations that work for the country’s development. The Association aspires to a safe society in which all Afghans (men, women, children, elderly), regardless of their race, ethnicity, tribe, language and religion, receive equal benefit from development processes and collective work aimed at a better world.
Hambastagi is today the only secular, democratic, inter-ethnic and independent party existing in Afghanistan. It has 30,000 members from different ethnic groups present in the country, of which 10,000 are women. The party is also represented by provincial committees in 22 out of 34 provinces, each with three leaders, one woman and two men. Hambastagi has offices in major cities, but in some places its members, unable to have an office, meet in homes.
The party does not receive public funds, but is self-financed through members and supporters. The countries from which he receives political support are Italy, Germany with Die Linke and Sweden with the Left Party.
There is also a “Hambastagi Committee” based in Germany, founded by Afghan people residing in the country.
How and when the organization was born
The party, of secular and democratic inspiration, was founded in 2003 in view of the presidential elections (2004).
However, its founders come from far away and precisely from the fight against the Soviet invasion, fought largely within a coalition formed by the religious area of the moderate Islamists and the secular area of the mujahideen, both united against the common enemy . The secular area was made up of both men and several women who recognized themselves in democratic and left-wing ideals (“people’s mujahideen”: secular partisans of the resistance who had nothing to do with the jihadis, Islamic fundamentalists who fought in the name of Allah).
Party work
Hambastagi members fight against all forms of Islamic fundamentalism, against foreign occupation and for a secular democracy that guarantees rights for all, especially women. They fight for an independent, democratic and indivisible Afghanistan in which they can live without any ethnic, racial, religious, linguistic discrimination, belonging to clans or specific areas and where they can live in unity and security.
They believe extremely deeply in democracy, they are secular, they absolutely do not want Islamic dictates to influence political discourse, they fight for the conquest of women’s rights and promote human rights. All this work is done by organizing meetings with the population in cities and villages, literacy courses and events
The party is trying to build strong international solidarity and participated in a Conference in Lahore with Pakistani left-wing parties. He is also currently in contact with the parties of the Indian left.
One of its main objectives is to create a single democratic force, capable of intercepting and integrating the different expressions of dissent, an alternative party with a strong social base and capable of impacting Afghan politics.
CISDA and HAMBASTAGI
The main support that CISDA offers to the party is political
• In February 2011 he organized meetings of Hambastagi activists with Italian parties, local authorities and associations.
• In October 2011, a meeting was held at the Chamber of Deputies with the president of the PD parliamentarians in the foreign commission, Hon. Tempestini, and with the Hon. Delia Murer, organizer of the meeting.
• In June 2012 he issued a statement denouncing Hambastagi’s suspension from parliament.
• In 2013 he issued a further statement denouncing attacks by Afghan security forces during a party rally in Kabul.
• In May 2014 in the province of Badakhshan a huge landslide killed at least 350 people with over 2 thousand missing. In this desperate situation, Hambastagi immediately took action, bringing medical teams to the site who were able to reach this area, one of the most remote in the country, in the north-east, between the Hindu Kush and the Pamir mountains which has not seen no one’s help. CISDA financially supported this population support operation.
Association made up of relatives of the victims of the massacres committed in Afghanistan during the civil war of 1992-1996. After the fall of Afghan President Najibullah in the first months of 1992, all the factions of the mujahideen who had fought against the Soviet occupation forces in the years of the invasion (1978-1987) and then against the pro-Soviet regime began a violent war for control of the capital and the provinces. Between 1992 and 1996 Kabul was the scene of bloody fighting, which caused the death of thousands of civilians and the destruction of much of the city.
Most of the commanders in chief during this factional war are responsible for crimes against humanity. Despite the numerous testimonies and clear evidence of this reality, many of the leaders of the armed factions have subsequently held political and institutional positions in the governments that have followed one another from the fall of the Taliban regime (2001) to the present day.
The SAAJS fights for criminals to be brought to justice and a memorial to be built in memory of the victims.
Goals
The main objectives of SAAJS are:
• The establishment of an international tribunal for crimes perpetrated in the country
• The removal of all criminals from their government positions
• The search for all the “mass graves” not yet discovered and their culprits
• The construction of a memorial in memory of all the victims.
How and when the organization was born
The organization was born in 2007 within civil society, following the discovery of mass graves. Its main purpose is to seek the truth about war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in recent years forty years.
The first SAAJS demonstration takes place in front of the UNAMA headquarters in Kabul to put pressure on the United Nations and other institutions: the creation of a court competent to judge those responsible for the massacres is requested.
SAAJS projects
Transitional justice project “truth and justice”: the project was activated in 2008 in collaboration with the ICS Association and CISDA and European funding. The second phase of the project was refinanced by a European tender. The SAAJS Association has become the leader and the continuation of the activities is carried out in complete autonomy.
The objective of the project is the collection of testimonies on the crimes against humanity that were perpetrated from 1992 to 1996 to bring to the attention of the international community a truth as frightening as it is constantly and deliberately ignored by Western governments: the political class currently at government in Afghanistan is directly involved in crimes against humanity for which no one is being held accountable.
CISDA and SAAJS
In 2008, Cisda partnered with the ICS Consortium of Alessandria in the project to support Saajs of transitional justice “Truth and Justice” financed by the European Union.
He is currently collaborating on the construction of the memorial in memory of all the victims.
