Abdul Rab Rasul Sayyaf, a former jihadist leader, has implicitly responded to recent comments made by Yahya Unabi, a pro-Taliban imam in Panjshir Province, stating that “condoning the touching and stripping” of non-mahram women is religiously forbidden and the greatest “crime against Islam and humanity.”
In a post on his Facebook page, Sayyaf wrote, “Touching the bodies of non-mahram women is religiously forbidden, and stripping them is a grave crime. Justifying this act is the greatest crime against Islam and humanity.”
Previously, Unabi, during a sermon, suggested that Zarmina Pariyani, who had been arrested and imprisoned by Taliban intelligence and has left the country, “should have been stripped naked at a Kabul roundabout as a lesson for other freedom-seeking women.”
In his sermon, Unabi equated the pursuit of freedom with immorality.
Following her release from Taliban captivity, Zarmina Pariyani reported that she had been “stripped” by Taliban members while in prison.
The Powerful Afghan Women’s Movement has also reacted to Unabi’s remarks, stating that his sermon in a Panjshir mosque not only insulted the dignity and honor of women but also “questioned the pillars of Islamic, human, and global honor.”
The movement condemned the silence of religious scholars in the face of the Taliban’s oppression of women.
The movement has called on religious scholars not to ignore the plight of women in Afghanistan and to counter the “extremist, self-absorbed, and misogynistic” rhetoric of those who misuse Islam and human dignity for their own ends.
