BBC: The Taliban government have banned women from visiting the Band-e-Amir national park in Bamiyan province. Afghanistan’s acting minister of virtue and vice, Mohammad Khaled Hanafi, said women had not been observing hijab inside the park. He called on religious clerics and security agencies to forbid women from entering until a solution was found.      Full news...

RFE/RL: Hora Sadat, a prominent female Afghan YouTuber, mysteriously died in Kabul on August 21. Reports suggested the 25-year-old was poisoned after attending a public event. Sadat, who had 300,000 subscribers on YouTube, produced videos on social issues for a mainly young audience. She also participated in public events organized by women in Kabul, although she was not known for publicly criticizing the Taliban.      Full news...

Amu: As per reliable accounts, these women were participating in a protest held at a residence located in Khairkhana area in northern Kabul when the Taliban forces took them into custody.A video obtained by Amu captures the moment when a contingent of Taliban members entered the premises, making efforts to detain the women involved.      Full news...

8am: In a recent and concerning development, Taliban fighters have reportedly detained eight individuals associated with the “Union and Solidarity of Afghan Women” movement following an attack on a gathering of women protesters in Kabul. Sources reveal that the Taliban apprehended these eight individuals within Kabul city and have taken them into custody. The incident unfolded on Sunday, August 20th, when Taliban fighters executed the arrests from a confined location in the Khairkhana district of Kabul.      Full news...

RAWANews: On the 15th August, two terrible years have passed when, according to the plans of the US and NATO, the brutal and misogynist creatures named Taliban, were replaced with the "republican" brothers and took the responsibility for the advancement of the United States colonial policies in our homeland; Two years that brought nothing but the collapse of the last manifestations of freedom, humanity and knowledge, poverty and cruelty for the people and especially the women of Afghanistan...      Full news...

VOA:The Taliban on Wednesday banned all political parties in Afghanistan, stating that such activities are against Islamic law, or Sharia. More than 70 major and small political parties were formally registered with the Ministry of Justice until two years ago, when the then-insurgent Taliban reclaimed control of war-ravaged Afghanistan. Many self-exiled Afghan political leaders have since opposed the new rulers in Kabul and called for armed resistance to dislodge them, but they have not received international backing for their campaign.      Full news...

The Guardian: Shima Forugh* was in 10th grade at school when she decided she would join the Afghan army. It had been taboo in Afghanistan’s patriarchal society for women to join the military, but hundreds of women like Forugh broke through this restriction.When she was 21, she joined the 207th Zafar army corps in Herat. Her father, who was also a member of the Afghan army, and mother both supported her decision to sign up.      Full news...

Afghanistan International: On Saturday, two groups of women held demonstrations in Kabul and Takhar against the "tyrannical policies of the Taliban".Sources from Kabul told Afghanistan International that the Taliban had been aware of the women’s demonstration in Kabul and still attacked the demonstrators.However, Afghanistan International received images from the protest site which showed that the female protesters had changed the location of the demonstration and read their resolution in a different area.      Full news...

Classic FM: Photos have emerged from Afghanistan of musical instruments being set on fire by the Taliban as a spokesperson for the ruling government describes music as “immoral”. One photo showing four men watching a large pile of instruments engulfed by flames was released to the press by the Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice on Sunday and was reportedly taken in Herat, Afghanistan’s third largest city.      Full news...

BBC News: The Taliban have burned musical instruments in Afghanistan, claiming music “causes moral corruption”. Thousands of dollars worth of musical equipment went up in smoke on a bonfire on Saturday in western Herat province. Since taking power in 2021, the Taliban have imposed numerous restrictions, including on playing music in public. All forms of music were banned from social gatherings, TV, and radio while the Taliban were in power in Afghanistan from the mid-90s until 2001.      Full news...

WION: Gen-Z, their predecessor millennials and even the people from Gen-X often take to social media when they are behind or near the wheel, to show a fleeting world in front of the car's windshield sometimes accompanied by a particular music track.For Zareena, 24, who last year lost her right to attend university in Taliban-ruled Afghanistan's capital Kabul, a behind-the-steering-wheel Snapchat update while she was on Kabul's roads was a part of her life until August 2021. Not anymore.      Full news...

NBC News: Dozens of Afghan women protested a beauty salon ban Wednesday after the Taliban ordered their closure nationwide. Security forces used fire hoses and stun guns and shot their weapons into the air to break up the protest.The Taliban said this month they were giving all salons in Afghanistan one month to wind down their businesses and close shop, drawing concern from international officials worried about the impact on female entrepreneurs. The Taliban say they are outlawing salons because they offer services forbidden by Islam and cause economic hardship for grooms’ families during wedding festivities.      Full news...

Zan Times: Zarifa Ghafari had arguably one of the toughest jobs in the world: being a female mayor in Afghanistan. But, aside from that political role, Zan Times discovered that some of Ghafari’s claims about her life, education, and experiences contained contradictions and inconsistencies. Zan Times discovered that even basic information, such as her place of birth, is inconsistent across the media. According to her memoir, she was born in Kabul. A piece published by Vanity Fair in March 2023 reports that she was born in Paktia province. However, back in 2018, she told Afghanistan’s EtilaatRoz that she was “born in Maidan Wardak.”      Full news...

UNICEF: An estimated 3.7 million children are out-of-school in Afghanistan. 60 per cent of girls and 46 per cent of boys of primary school age are currently not attending any level of education in Afghanistan. Even when children are enrolled in school, they are not always learning. Years of previous conflict, coupled with poor infrastructure, have made some schools unsafe for children. Many public schools lack adequate classrooms, qualified teachers, school supplies, and places where children can wash their hands.      Full news...

The Washington Post: Afghanistan’s primary mental health facility in Kabul has filled with patients who say they are experiencing a different kind of suffering, he said. With the Taliban leadership severely restricting female education and work, there are mounting concerns about the mental health of girls and women. The restrictions and “sudden changes,” said Azim, appear to be at the root of the trauma suffered by most women and girls now seeking help at this hospital.      Full news...

Foreign Policy: For the Taliban, who’ve made so much money from other illicit trades, arms deals are just another source of income: The Taliban likely control and tax the new black market, said Asfandyar Mir, a South Asia expert at the U.S. Institute of Peace. And as the Taliban (and allied terrorist groups) seek new recruits, few things talk more eloquently than fancy, deadly kit. Left-behind American assault rifles command a premium: an M4 in good condition can fetch up to $2,400, a status symbol with as much cachet in the Himalayan tribal belt as a luxury handbag in Manhattan.      Full news...

The Guardian: The Taliban administration in Afghanistan has ordered beauty salons to close within a month, the morality ministry said, in the latest shrinking of access to public places for Afghan women. “The deadline for the closing of beauty parlours for women is one month,” Mohammad Sadiq Akif, a spokesperson for the Ministry for the Prevention of Vice and Propagation of Virtue, said on Tuesday, referring to a ministry notice.      Full news...

EFE: Without a husband or grown-up sons to go out and earn in a highly orthodox and patriarchal Islamist society, widows in Afghanistan are left in a lurch, condemned to poverty on account of increasing restrictions on women by the Taliban. Fatima is the oldest of four widows in a 100 square meter house in the northern state of Kandahar, a few meters from the office of the provincial governor. The other three are her 25- and 30-year-old daughters-in-law – each with four children – and her niece, who has one child.      Full news...

Afghanistan International: The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) said in a new report that there are increasing signs of large methamphetamine manufacture in Afghanistan and expanded trafficking through South Asia for global markets. The World Drug Report 2023 also stated in the report that the bulk of global illicit opium production continues to take place in Afghanistan, wherein in 2022, production reached 6,200 tonnes, equivalent to 80% of the estimated global production.      Full news...

Tortoise media: Afghan women working for the UN in Kabul say they have been betrayed by the organisation’s failure to protect them from the Taliban’s gender apartheid. Also in today’s Sensemaker: why an opposition win in Thailand isn’t quite a win.      Full news...

THE SCOTSMAN: The opposition party in Afghanistan has "strongly appealed" to the United Nations Security Council and the international community to refrain from legitimising the Taliban regime ahead of the UN’s quarterly meeting on Afghanistan. The National Resistance Council for the Salvation of Afghanistan (NRCSA) warned international authorities that recognising the Taliban as a legitimate government would be detrimental to the pursuit of peace, stability, and the rights of the Afghan people      Full news...

Devdiscourse: "One of the most illustrative examples of the systematic discrimination against women and girls in Afghanistan today is the relentless issuance of edicts, decrees, declarations and directives restricting their rights, including their freedom of movement, attire and behaviour, and their access to education, work, health and justice,"      Full news...

Fox News: Issa said the cable also revealed that “there was no expectation” by the State Department that there would be sustainability in the region and knew that the billions of dollars of U.S. military equipment that was left behind was going to fall into the Taliban’s hands. Issa said the cable went out on July 13, 2021, the response came back a week later on July 20, and Kabul officially fell weeks later on Aug. 15.      Full news...

Amnesty International: The report, ‘The Taliban’s war on women: The crime against humanity of gender persecution in Afghanistan’, presents a detailed legal analysis of how the Taliban’s draconian restrictions on the rights of Afghanistan’s women and girls, together with the use of imprisonment, enforced disappearance, torture and other ill-treatment, could amount to the crime against humanity of gender persecution under Article 7(1)(h) of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC).      Full news...

UN News: This year, some 2.3 million Afghan boys and girls are expected to face acute malnutrition. Of this number, 875,000 will need treatment for severe acute malnutrition, a life-threatening condition. Furthermore, around 840,000 pregnant women and breastfeeding mothers are likely to experience acute malnutrition, jeopardising their ability to give their babies the best start in life.      Full news...

SALAM WATANDAR: “We came to Kabul from Kapisa, hoping that some job would be available for us, but for now, my husband works as laborer and I am also a housewife. It is nearly impossible to pay the expenses of the house of my in-laws, which was used for our livelihood.” said Sheeba, a woman who worked as a teacher before the establishment of the Islamic Emirate. After imposition of restrictions on women, she stayed at home and her husband became unemployed at the same time.Sheeba said that she used to work as a teacher in Kapisa and with the closing of the schools, she became unemployed and now she is in confused and without a future plan. Unemployment has multiplied the pressure of life on her shoulders. “Problems of house rent and food cannot be solved. This situation hurts me and puts pressure on my soul. We have a miserable life.”      Full news...

8 Subh: Female prisoners in Taliban-controlled prisons in the provinces of Jowzjan, Faryab, and Samangan are enduring a deplorable situation. They face humiliation, insults, physical torture, and sexual assault. According to the findings of Hasht-e Subh Daily, since the collapse of the Republic regime, the Taliban have detained and imprisoned 90 women in the three northern provinces. Out of these, 36 women are in Faryab province, 34 women are in Samangan province, and another 20 women are in Jowzjan province. These women have been subjected to inappropriate treatment by the Taliban in prisons over the past year.      Full news...

UN News: Following a systematic crackdown on the rights of Afghan women and girls by the Taliban – from attending school to working at the UN – “the stage may be set for multiple preventable deaths that could amount to femicide” unless restrictions are reversed rapidly, independent UN human rights experts announced on Friday, following an eight-day visit to the country.      Full news...

Hasht-e-Subh Daily: Numerous reports have surfaced over the past two years about extramarital relationships and sexual assault by Taliban commanders on young women and girls during their rule in the country. Recently, in Ghor province, a Taliban militant named Abdul Qodos attempted to sexually assault a young girl named Zarmina in her father’s house in the Saad Siah area of the city of Firozkoh, the center of Ghor province. When Zarmina resisted, Abdul Qodos shot and killed her. Reliable sources in Ghor province have confirmed these details.      Full news...

EuroNews: A group of Afghan women protested in Kabul on Saturday, defying a crackdown on dissent to urge foreign nations not to formally recognise the Taliban government ahead of a United Nations summit next week.Protesters opposing creeping curbs on women’s rights have been beaten or detained since the Taliban surged back to power in 2021, and security forces have fired into the air to disperse some rallies.      Full news...