KEY POINTS:
It was another murder among so many in the bloody conflict in Afghanistan - a senior police officer gunned down by the Taleban.
But the death of Malalai Kakar last week has removed a brave and dedicated champion of oppressed women; it has raised the fears of other women in public life that they too have, in effect, been sentenced to death.
Of five prominent women interviewed three years ago by the Independent for an article on post-Taleban female emancipation, three, including Kakar, are dead.
A fourth has had to flee after escaping assassination in an ambush in which her husband was killed.
Religious fundamentalists are waging a ruthless campaign to eliminate women who have taken up high-profile jobs. Parliamentarians, school-teachers, civil servants, security officials and women journalists have been selected for attacks by the jihadists.
Countless others have been maimed and murdered in villages where the vengeful Taleban have returned to impose the old order.
In the case of Kakar, the most prominent policewoman in Afghanistan, an additional "crime" which sealed her fate was that she was a determined and effective campaigner for women's rights.
Kakar, 40, knew her work made her a Taleban target. She led a unit of 10 policewomen specialising in domestic violence cases. She was uncompromising with suspected abusers, men who had relied on male police officers to turn a blind eye.
"I've been accused of being rough with husbands who beat up their wives," she said. "But I'm angry. The constitution is supposed to protect women's rights."
Kakar liked to cook breakfast for her husband and six children before going to work. She sais she would spend a long time saying her farewell because she could never be sure what would happen. Her 15-year-old son was with her when she was killed.
Like Kakar, Shaima Rezayee believed in a brave new world for Afghan women. After five years of burqa-wearing under Taleban rule, the 24-year-old presented a popular music show called Hop on the independent channel Tolo TV and helped run schemes to promote women in the media. But when I asked for her help with this article, she was pessimistic.
"Things are not getting better," she cautioned. "We made some gains, but there are a lot of people who want to take it all back."
Her station was being condemned for allowing her, a female in Western clothes and make-up, to talk freely to men on the programme.
Eventually she was dismissed after pressure from conservative clerics who accused Tolo of "broadcasting music, naked dance and foreign films".
Shaima was gunned down at her home near Kabul's diplomatic quarters. Her killers, police said, appeared to have been people she had known as they did not have to force their way into the house.
- INDEPENDENT
