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: JURIST - The Paper Chase

Afghanistan lawmaker and women's rights advocate killed by Taliban

By Bernard Hibbitts (editor) and University of Pittsburgh School of Law students.

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[JURIST] The Taliban have claimed responsibility for the Sunday killing of Sitara Achakzai, a women's rights advocate in Afghanistan and a member of Kandahar's provincial assembly. Achakzai, who had returned to Afghanistan to pursue women's rights after living in Germany during the Taliban's rule, was shot outside her Kandahar home after being approached by gunmen on motorcycles. The killing comes in the midst of controversy over the Afghan central government's Shi'ite Personal Status Law, which reportedly requires a woman to seek her husband's permission before leaving the house and effectively condones rape within a marriage. The text of that law has not been officially published. Last week, Mohammad Asif Mohseni, a key Shi'ite cleric, defended the status law and characterized Western criticism of it as interference with Afghan democracy. President Hamid Karzai signed the measure into law in March - reportedly as a conciliatory measure towards the Taliban - then called for its review under mounting international pressure.

Full post as published by JURIST - The Paper Chase on April 12, 2009 (boomark / email).