Afghan women fear return to ‘dark days’ amid Taliban sweep

By ZEINA KARAM and AHMAD SEIR
Associated Press

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — The Taliban’s lightning advance across Afghanistan has stirred fears they will reimpose their fundamentalist interpretation of Islam and all but eliminate women’s rights. Before they were ousted by the U.S. invasion in 2001, the Taliban forbade girls an education and women the right to work, and refused even to let them travel outside their homes without a male relative. They also stoned women accused of adultery. One Afghan woman says she fears that if the Taliban come to power again, “we will return back to the same dark days.”