Return Of The Religious Police To Afghanistan

Afghanistan to reconstitute religious police Karzai government insists new version will educate, not repress

Nearly five years after the ouster of the fundamentalist Taliban regime, President Hamid Karzai plans to breathe new life into a strict Islamic institution that many Afghans were happy to see die: the Amr Bilmaruf va Nahi az Mankar, or literally, "Do the good, don't do the bad."

Last month, Karzai's Cabinet approved a proposal to re-establish the agency also known as the Department for the Prevention of Vice and Promotion of Virtue, whose police under the Taliban beat and imprisoned Afghans for violating Shariah law. For many, the revival of religious cops raises painful memories of ruffians zipping around Kabul in Datsun pickups mainly in search of women and girls who refused to wear the head-to-toe burqa, donned high heels, wore nail polish or walked down city streets without a male relative. Men were cited for sporting short beards, drinking alcohol, working during prayer time, playing chess or listening to nonreligious music.

Full Story, SF Chronicle, August 19, 2006

My letter to the SF Chronicle:

Dear Editor:

Remind me, what was all that empty rhetoric Bu$h said about women having rights and being respected in Afghanistan thanks to the U.S. throwing out the Taliban?

Oh yes, another pack of lies, just like the reason for invading and conquering Iraq being the imminent threat posed by Saddam Hussein and his weapons of mass destruction.

Sincerely,

Terry L. Clark