AFGHANISTAN

In 1977 a number of women intellectuals established the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA) in Kabul. RAWA agitated for a democratically chosen government and sought to advance the rights of Afghan women. During the Soviet occupation RAWA founded schools and hospitals for Afghan refugees in Pakistan. They also provided education for women, to the rage of the Communist occupiers and fundamentalist Islam. Many RAWA members, including its founder Meena Kishwar Kamel, were murdered. In 1981 the movement founded its own magazine, Payam-e-Zam (“Message for Women”). The magazine is still ongoing, just as is their struggle, now that the United States has replaced the Taliban with other fundamentalist warlords. A well-tried instrument in their struggle is the camera hidden under their burka, for filming and photographing abuses involving Afghan women.