Thousands of people raced to Kabul's airport Friday, struggling to get past crushing crowds, desperate for a flight out of Afghanistan and an escape from Taliban rule. Video / AP
A group of young Afghans have said they were flogged by Taliban fighters for the crime of wearing jeans.
In a post widely shared on Facebook, an Afghan youth said they were "walking with friends in Kabul," when they encountered a group of Taliban soldiers who accused them of disrespecting Islam.
Two of the friends escaped, the youth said, but the others were beaten, whipped on their necks and threatened at gunpoint.
Taliban fighters search a vehicle at a checkpoint on the road in the Wazir Akbar Khan neighborhood in the city of Kabul. Photo / AP
The Afghan newspaper Etilaatroz reported over the weekend that one of its journalists had also been beaten for not wearing "Afghan clothes," such as full-body gowns.
There have been other reports of Afghan youths being targeted for wearing T-shirts as well as jeans.
A Taliban official told Etilaatroz that the movement was still deciding on the dress code for men.
Both incidents will increase concerns that little has changed in the Taliban since the late 1990s, when it was commonplace for Afghans caught without religious clothing to be beaten or even killed.
During the first period of its control over Afghanistan, which ended with the US invasion of 2001, the Taliban was notorious for its misogyny, religious extremism and brutal punishments.
Women who broke the Taliban's rules, inspired by radical interpretations of severe law, were routinely flogged or executed.
Forced to wear a burqa from the age of eight, they were also banned from working and going to school, or even from leaving the house.
In Kandahar women who painted their nails could have their fingers cut off, and there was a ban on them wearing shoes with heels as "no stranger should hear a woman's footsteps".
Burqa prices double in Kabul amid soaring demand
Since sweeping to power for the second time in Afghanistan, Taliban leaders have sought to present themselves to Western observers as a more moderate group.
Afghan women in burqas walk on a street in Kabul, Afghanistan , on Sunday. Photo / AP
They claim, for instance, that the Taliban will respect women and does not wish them to become "victims" of Sharia law.
However, there have been numerous reports of female workers being ordered to leave their jobs and to send a male relative to take their place.
On Sunday, Aisha Khurram, a former youth representative to the United Nations, said the Taliban had summoned Afghan civil servants to their offices, only to dismiss all the women.
"Taliban asked civil servants in Kabul to get back to their offices, but when everyone showed up, they dismissed female workers - justifying it as [an] unconducive security situation for women," she wrote on Twitter.
"They repeated the same thing for five years during their regime in the 1990s and the security situation remained a justification for erasing women from society. What could be different this time?," she added.
The price of a burqa meanwhile has reportedly doubled in Kabul amid a surge in demand.
