Speaking outside of the UN General Assembly, the actress stressed that even animals now have more rights in Afghanistan due to stricter laws pertaining to women.
In response, a Taliban spokesman claimed that they “highly respected” women and “never compared them to cats.”
Streep’s comments came after the Taliban government last month unveiled a new set of “morality laws.”Among other things, these rules forbid women from making public statements or looking directly at men with whom they are not engaged or related by blood.
Since regaining power three years ago, the regime has imposed numerous restrictions on Afghan women and girls, these latest of which are the latest measures.
Women are expected to cover their faces and entire bodies when they leave their homes. Girls and women are also not allowed in gyms, sports clubs, parks, or schools. There are limitations on the types of work they can do.
“In Kabul today, a female cat enjoys greater freedom than a woman. “A cat may go sit on her front stoop and feel the sun on her face, she may chase a squirrel in the park,” Streep remarked on Monday at an event held at the UN headquarters in New York to raise awareness of Afghan women’s rights.
“In Afghanistan today, a squirrel has more rights than a girl because the Taliban have barred women and girls from entering public parks.
In Kabul, girls are not allowed to sing in public, but birds are. This is really remarkable. In this way, the natural law is being suppressed.
“The way that this culture and society have been changed should serve as a cautionary tale to the rest of the world,” Streep said, calling on world leaders to “quit suffocating Afghan women and girls little by little.”
During the same function, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said that Afghanistan “will never take its rightful place on the global stage” in the absence of educated and employed women.
‘I
