Pakistan warns that the Taliban still allow terrorist groups to operate from Afghan territory, telling a UN human rights forum that violence linked to Afghanistan has killed more than 4,700 Pakistanis over the past three years, while a UN expert separately urged governments not to treat the Kabul authorities as a normal partner without proven rights progress.
Speaking at the UN Human Rights Council’s interactive dialogue on Afghanistan on Thursday evening, Pakistan’s representative Muhammad Jawad Ajmal said Islamabad faces a continuing security threat from groups he accused of working with impunity on Afghan soil. He alleged that those networks maintain close ties with the Taliban and receive backing from external actors that target Pakistan and other neighbours. The Taliban’s failure to publicly denounce them, he argued, showed complicity and active support.
Rights crackdown and women under Taliban rule
Ajmal tied the worsening rights climate to what he called the Taliban’s disregard for international obligations. He said women and girls are being denied basic freedoms and dignity through measures that, in Pakistan’s view, clash with Islamic law, traditions and the tenets of the Muslim faith.
He pointed to the ninth Ministerial Conference on Women, hosted by Pakistan in Islamabad in July, where the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC, a grouping of Muslim-majority states) adopted the Islamabad Declaration. That text voiced concern that Taliban curbs on women and girls run against Islamic values.
UN Special Rapporteur Richard Bennett — an independent expert mandated to report on human rights in Afghanistan — told the General Assembly that five years after seizing power, the Taliban have shown no willingness to undo systematic abuses. Instead, he said, they have tightened restrictions, especially on women and girls. Recent decrees, he added, have further weakened women’s rights, facilitated violence against them and made it nearly impossible for women to leave abusive relationships. He also said the authorities have permitted child marriages.
What the UN expert documented
Bennett urged member states to hold back from normalising relations until the Taliban reverse oppressive policies. His report listed arbitrary detention, torture, sexual violence, enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings. It also flagged curbs on free expression, the exclusion of people with disabilities, and discrimination or persecution of ethnic, religious, linguistic and other marginalised minorities.
Pakistan’s intervention stressed security as much as rights. Ajmal framed cross-border terrorism as an ongoing pattern rather than a settled grievance, arguing that Afghan soil remains a base for attacks on Pakistan.
Timeline: what has happened so far
- July: Pakistan hosts the OIC’s ninth Ministerial Conference on Women in Islamabad; the bloc adopts the Islamabad Declaration on Taliban restrictions affecting women and girls.
- Five years into Taliban rule: Bennett tells the General Assembly the movement has not reversed systematic human rights violations and has deepened curbs, especially on women and girls.
- Thursday evening: Ajmal addresses the Human Rights Council dialogue on Afghanistan, citing more than 4,700 Pakistani deaths from Afghanistan-originating attacks over three years and accusing the Taliban of enabling terror groups.
Aasan alfaaz mein
Pakistan ne UN ko kaha ke Afghanistan se aane wali dehshatgardi ab bhi bohat bada khatra hai, aur teen saalon mein 4,700 se zyada Pakistani mar chuke hain. UN ke expert ne kaha ke Taliban ne auraton aur larkiyon par sakht pabandiyan aur zyada kar di hain. Wo kehte hain ke jab tak haqooq behtar na hon, duniya Taliban se mamooli rishta na banaye. Is ka matlab yeh hai ke border ke paas rehne walon aur poore mulk ke liye security aur Afghan siyasat dono ab bhi serious masla hain.
