Yalda Hakim reveals shock conversation she had with Taliban

An Australian TV anchor has revealed the shocking conversation she had with a Taliban leader about women’s rights, challenging the group’s “new” image.

An Afghan-born Australian journalist has revealed a shocking conversation she had with a Taliban leader.

Despite the more modern persona the notorious group is pushing — its assurances of “no revenge on anyone” and its treatment towards women are being questioned.

Yalda Hakim, a BBC anchor who appeared on Q&A’s Afghanistan special, shared details about a conversation she had with a Taliban frontline commander which was very different to the image being pushed during the press conference earlier this week.

“It was very similar to what I have heard the Taliban say before. They’ve said it to me on-air, they’ve said it to me face-to-face when I travelled to Doha — that women would have their rights, there wouldn’t be any revenge attacks or reprisals,” Hakim said about the conference.

But, the 38-year-old journalist, who just a few weeks ago spent almost one month reporting from her native country, claimed the commander told her otherwise.

“I asked him a series of questions and he said to me we want to return to the kind of rule we had to in the 90s,” Hakim explained.

“So, when I asked about for example, if a woman was accused of adultery, now adultery based on whose judgments, he said ‘of course we would have stonings, we would have public executions and would use soccer stadiums to do that kind of thing. There would be amputations on hands and feet, if someone were to commit the crime of theft’.

“He said this is all laid out in the Koran. This is all part of Sharia law and if you want to live within it, great, if not you’ll face the kind of reprisals you’ll need to.”

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BBC presenter Yalda Hakim revealed a shocking conversation she had with a Taliban leader. Picture: ABC

Hakim’s comments come after Taliban fighters shot and killed a woman for allegedly not wearing a burqa in Afghanistan on Tuesday.

It also happened to be the same day the group pledged to usher in a new inclusive era in the country of “women’s rights”.

The horrific act is a far cry from a conversation Hakim also had with the group’s spokesman, Shail Shaheen, who called her unexpectedly during a live segment.

He claimed the Taliban would respect the rights of women and allow them access to education.

Under previous Taliban rule girls weren’t allowed to go to school, women were forced to wear the burqa and weren’t allowed out without a male guardian.

As the Taliban try hard to push their new image, Afghan women are not convinced they will be safe under the notorious group’s “new and peaceful” agenda.

Speaking on Q&A, Yalda claimed the leader would ‘stone women’ who committed adultery. Picture: ABC

Many women in Kabul are scared for their lives. Zarifa Ghafari, 27, the country’s first female mayor, said last week: “I’m sitting here waiting for them to come. There’s no one to help me or my family; they’ll come for people like me and kill me.”

Dozens of women journalists from global media organisations are currently stationed in Kabul — and just one of three female reporters allowed into the conference wasted no time in confronting the organisation’s leaders on their attitude towards women.

Charlotte Bellis, a NZ-born journalist who reports for Al Jazeera, asked whether Afghan women can be assured the right to continue work and study and also asked if the new government would once more lock women and female children in their houses and refuse them education or jobs.

To this, the Taliban responded that women’s rights will be guaranteed “within the limits of Islam”.

First question from Taliban to Al Jazeera female reporter asking about women's rights. Zabiullah Mujahid says women have rights as long as they follow sharia law pic.twitter.com/6xzD3xzZsk

— Yalda Hakim (@BBCYaldaHakim) August 17, 2021

A spokesman told Bellis the “Islamic Emirate” was “committed to the rights of women”. although only “within our framework of sharia”, suggesting women would still find their lives much restricted.

Diana Sayed, CEO of the Australian Muslim Women’s Centre for Human Rights, said the Taliban’s ideological mentality hasn’t shifted and the notorious group is just “all talk”.

“What they’ve got is a very sophisticated PR (public relations) machine now and they have got social media at their disposal,” she said on Q&A on Thursday.

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Diana Sayed said despite the ‘new image’ the Taliban are pushing, she doesn’t trust anything they are ‘spinning’. Picture: ABC

“Just because they have a spokesman and they’re able to use Twitter doesn’t necessarily erase the ideology — their sense on women's rights, on how they will continue to persecute other minority groups and others at risk in the country.

“I don’t trust anything that they are actually now spinning.”

Also on the panel was international security expert, Lydia Khalil, who said you only have to look at what the Taliban did in the 90s, when they originally came to power, to get a glimpse of the future.

“They said exactly the same things — ‘there won’t be any reprisals, ‘we won’t go door-to-door, ‘our rule would not be brutal’.

International security expert Lydia Khalil agreed the Taliban’s ideologies haven’t changed nor has their vision for Afghanistan. Picture: ABC

“But then we saw what happened. They governed according this archaic and brutal Islamic rule which frankly many of the world’s Muslims do not consider as legitimate.”

Ms Sayed said for the time being, the Taliban crave international legitimacy and they need the aid — and because of that, they will be making the “right noises”.

“But again, their ideology hasn't changed and their vision for Afghanistan hasn’t changed and we shouldn't expect it to.”