📅 DATE: Wednesday 16 July 2025
🕖 TIME: 12pm – 2pm
📍LOCATION: SPAAK 7C50, EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT, Rue Wiertz 60, 1047 Bruxelles, Belgium
On Wednesday 16th July 2025, the Afghanistan and Central Asian Association (ACAA), an award-winning British Charity, convened with EU policy-makers and other experts in a roundtable on Women’s and Girls’ Rights in Afghanistan, hosted in collaboration with MEP Cecilia Strada and MEP Alessandra Moretti at the European Parliament in Brussels. Among the speakers were Raquel García Hermida Van der Walle, Chair of the EU delegation for relations with Afghanistan, Lailuma Sadid, journalist and former diplomat to Belgium for Afghanistan, and Dr. Nooralhaq Nasimi MBE, our founder and CEO. The roundtable also featured 150 participants in a thought-provoking engagement with the Afghan diaspora, as well as diplomats and representatives from major organisations. We were pleased to welcome Dan Hadary, Second Secretary for Foreign Policy at the UK Mission to the EU, and Chandana Weerasena, Sri Lanka Ambassador to Belgium at the European Union and Luxembourg to our discussion.
The conference comes at a crucial time for women’s rights across Afghanistan. Almost four years after the takeover of Kabul by the Taliban in August 2021, women have been erased from public life, with restrictions on their access to post-primary education, employment, independent movement, freedom of speech and self-expression (UN women). As remarked by MEP Cecilia Strada, discrimination and violence faced by women and girls on the basis of their gender is a crime against humanity, defined as gender persecution under EU asylum law.
Furthermore, the challenges faced by women persevere within the Afghan diaspora. Forced migration often comes with trauma and integration difficulties linked to language barriers, lack of employment opportunities and discrimination. Furthermore, since January 2025, more than one million Afghan refugees, mainly in Iran and Pakistan, have been displaced and forced to return to Afghanistan, with around 50% of these being women (UNHCR).
In this context, the daily work done by the ACAA is extremely valuable in creating support systems and combatting increasing isolation of refugees. This features English language and digital literacy courses, legal and immigration drop-in advice, cultural events, community workshops on key issues such as health and civil rights, women empowerment activities and a girls football team.
The conference was strongly focused on the role of Afghan civil society and how a collaboration with EU and UK institutions can lead to the development of long-term strategies for peace and stability in the region. Darius Nasimi, our Head of Funding and Partnerships and founder of the Afghanistan Government in Exile (AGiE) also stressed the importance of involving development entities within Afghanistan.
Forums like these, where open exchange between policymakers and citizens is fostered, are essential, but as many shared after the conference: it is not enough. The crisis in Afghanistan is one of the most pressing in the world, yet media attention as well as tangible actions from EU policymakers have not been proportional to the needs of Afghanistan.
The Taliban’s further positioning at international level is of concern given Russia’s recent legitimisation of the regime on July 3rd (BBC). Furthermore, European countries open correspondence with the Taliban when instrumental to their own policies, which reveals that isolation of the Taliban internationally is only partially true. Just this Friday the 18th of July, 81 Afghans were deported from Germany to Afghanistan, having received criminal charges, as a part of a wider scheme adopted by the Merz government (APnews). Specifically to the UK, a data leak from 2022 reached public attention this month, exposing information on thousands of Afghans who worked for the British secret forces before their withdrawal from Afghanistan.
As Chair of the EU delegation for relations with Afghanistan, Raquel García Hermida Van der Walle pointed out, creative solutions need to be adopted to contrast the further positioning of the Taliban and their toll on women’s and girl’s human rights, even in absence of formal diplomatic relations.
Adjacently, there is an urgent need for the Afghan diaspora across Europe and the UK to come together and strengthen its political representation, in a more bottom-up manner. Our founder and CEO, Dr Nooralhaq Nasimi MBE delivered a compelling speech outlining the lack of cohesion between ethnic groups within Afghanistan, a result of historical contingencies reaching back to the 1700’s. He highlighted the systematic targeting of the Tajik community in the North of Afghanistan and the millions of lives lost in war between 1979 and 1989. Dr Nasimi advocates for the formation of a Taliban opposition, either in exile or inside Afghanistan, the establishment of a diaspora council in the UK and a coalition for Afghanistan’s democratic future. In Afghanistan, he suggests the establishment of a decentralised government and of 8 economic zones in Afghanistan.
As repeatedly voiced by the audience, long-term objectives need to be combined with short-term tangible action. Zuhal Sherzad, called for the establishment of “clandestine schools” in Afghanistan and greater employment opportunities for women. Arzo Naubahar shared the lived experience of violence and precarity of Tajik Women in the North. Farishta Shorangez sang a beautiful melody, proving how music can be a form of resistance and expression of pain. Many European speakers as well as members of the Afghan diaspora expressed the need to adopt art as a way to communicate the lived experience, advocate for human rights and build a network. They call for the assistance of female artists and musicians in Afghanistan, who are at risk of persecution.
The conference was an opportunity to bring those committed to the crisis in Afghanistan in one room and share inputs. But it is only the beginning. There is an urgent need for policy reform and unconditional commitment to the Afghanistan cause on parts of EU institutions. On the other hand, Afghan diaspora leaders need to come together and build representative councils in exile.
As Shabnam Nasimi, the conference’s moderator and the founder of the Friends of Afghan Women Network (FAWN) remarked, there is no “easy” long term solution, but what matters are community, sense of humanity and tangible action, in guiding the future of Afghan girls and women going forward, to a better place.
We stand in solidarity with all those affected and look forward to hosting more events like these. For further information about the ACAA’s work, stay updated by following our social media pages on Instagram, Twitter and Linkedin.
Written by: Chiara Stoelzle Reina
To watch the video report of the conference, please click here: