The Associated Press recently published an article on the horrific abuse one young bride experienced at the hands of her new in-laws who tried to force her to participate in their prostitution ring. The article also highlights the injustices that lock women up in Afghan prisons.
From the article, “The U.N. says more than half of Afghanistan’s female prison population is made up of women sentenced by local courts for fleeing their marriages – the charge is often phrased as “intent to commit adultery,” even though that’s not a crime under Afghan law.”
Last month, Karzai pardoned a 19-year-old woman who was imprisoned after she was raped by a cousin and became pregnant. A local court sentenced her to 12 years in prison for having sex out of wedlock, a crime in Afghanistan. The judge told her she could get out of prison if she agreed to marry her alleged rapist. This makes perfect sense in Afghan culture. It’s the only way to remove her shame – the shame of being pregnant out of wedlock. And, of course, no other man would want her since she had been “soiled”. Amazingly, this very brave woman refused the offer and gave birth to her daughter in prison.
Reflections on My Visit to a Women’s Prison in Afghanistan
In 2005, I had the rare privilege of visiting Afghan women in prison and learning firsthand why they were there. 
It was truly miraculous that I was able to go into the prison. I was just visiting Afghanistan at that time, but many seasoned NGO workers in that city had longed to go in that prison for years to let those women know they were not forgotten and to offer them some classes in English or sewing.
The only reason I and my two Finnish friends were allowed in was because another Afghan woman, a prominent lady in the city and head of an NGO, had brought us there. I’ll call her Tamana. When we arrived, we had to wait an uncomfortably long time standing conspicuously under the covering of the entrance just off the street and peering in through a barred window at the guard on the other side. Women’s NGOs had been granted the right to visit the women’s prison at any time in hopes that the possibility of a surprise visit and the watching eyes of others would deter the male guards from abusing the female inmates. Sadly, that right was rarely honored. This women’s prison was under the jurisdiction of the men’s prison director just down the street.
First we heard from our contact that he would meet us there at the entrance to let us in, but when he didn’t come for a very long time, my Afghan friend called again. It seemed he was hesitating in hopes that we would just go away. He was very careful about who he lets in because he didn’t want any bad publicity. He wanted us to come to the men’s prison to introduce ourselves and explain why we wanted to go to the women’s prison to visit the prisoners. We walked passed armed guards into a plush office and sat down for what felt like questioning. The Prison Director wore military-like clothing and was quite intimidating.
One by one, we introduced ourselves. Tamana spoke first and used her masterful diplomacy skills in an attempt to persuade him for quite some time. One Finnish friend and I prayed silently to the Lord of heaven to grant us entrance. After 20 to 30 minutes of discussion and questioning, we were given permission to enter the prison.
Forty four women and their children occupied the prison compound. There was surprisingly little room for so many people. There were two rooms for bunk beds, one large empty room, and a room that housed the sewing equipment, including 40 sewing machines, one zig zag machine, and one overlock machine, none of which they could use because they had no training.
All the women were lined around the wall of the empty room. The despair in the air was almost tangible. I couldn’t imagine a more grim situation – many of them unjustly imprisoned, some of them estranged from and unwanted by their families because of the shame that being a prisoner brings, and with little hope of ever having a normal life. My Finnish friend took the lead and I followed behind her, greeting each woman personally, looking her in the eye and holding her hand. Their eyes were haunting, some of them hollow and empty, having lost hope, others pleading. Touching their hands, looking into their eyes, and greeting them was an incredible honor. These truly are the least of these, the ones the world has forgotten, the ones for whom justice seems almost impossible.
The women were in prison for various reasons. One 24 year old woman, Sharon (not her real name), was there for her husband’s crime. He had raped a 13 year old girl and thrown her body down their family well. The family of the victim suspected he was the culprit and sent the authorities to investigate. The police found the victim’s body in the well.
As the drama was unfolding, the husband who had murdered this young girl, persuaded his wife to lie and say that she had seen the girl there and was too scared to call the authorities. He reasoned she would get a lesser penalty for stumbling upon a dead body and not reporting it than he would get for having committed the crime. It wasn’t hard to convince her that if he went to jail, she would not be able to support the children and none of them would survive. He promised that if she would do this, he would visit her and bring the children to her while she was serving her time in jail. She agreed to this proposal.
Upon her confession, she was convicted and sentenced to 6 years in prison. It was later reduced to 4 years, 5 months. At the time of my visit, she had been in jail 3 years and 4 months, so had about one month to go. Her husband did bring the children to visit her every day for about 6 months, then the visits became less frequent. When she went into jail, her youngest was six months old. At the time of my visit, her children were 9 (boy), 6 (girl), 5 (girl), and 4 (boy).
Not being able to watch her children grow up was the most grisly part of the whole experience for her. While Sharon was in prison, her husband took another wife. Sharon had no idea where her children were and hadn’t seen them for a year. The family of the victim wrote a letter to the authorities saying they hold nothing against her and are confident she did not commit the crime. Sadly, the government would not re-open a case and undo all the papers where someone has confessed to a crime (even the crime of seeing a dead body and not reporting it).
Sharon stayed in jail longer than others who had sentences as long as hers because she was not able to offer a bribe. To her credit, instead of gathering money to make a bribe that would have secured her own early release, she asked her brother to pay $10,000 to the victim’s family as reparations for her husband’s crime which her brother did do for her. Although she couldn’t wait to get out of that place, her primary concern as her release date approached was where she would go and how she would survive when she got out. She wondered aloud why she was suffering for a crime she did not commit.
Another woman in the jail had a baby that she did not want. Perhaps she had been raped. She was just not able to care for him. Sharon informally adopted that baby boy and, although she had nothing materially to give him, she lavished her motherly love on him as if he was her own.
Another woman in the jail had escaped her violent husband. When she ran away from him in Iran, he was accused by the authorities of killing her. He was convicted and put in jail. When someone realized she was alive and living in Afghanistan in a shelter, they informed the authorities of the situation and she was taken to jail for holding. They needed to hold her to prove she was alive to secure his release from prison. Because the women’s shelter was not secure enough to prevent her from running, she was locked up in the women’s prison.
Another young woman who looked to be in her late teens was free to go, but had nowhere to go so she just stayed in the prison. The streets of Afghanistan are dangerous for a young woman with no male relatives to ward off the predators.
There were also a couple of teenage girls in prison there because there was no juvenile jail.
When Tamana explained that I didn’t have funds with me at that moment to help them, one woman responded for the group, saying that they appreciated that someone was taking their voice to others, that they felt encouragement just by our presence. I was so touched by that. I’m hoping to be able to send the funds via Western Union to Tamana to purchase equipment before I leave.
Thankfully, as I relaying this story to others in the U.S., they responded with generous donations that enabled OneMaker to provide two water heaters for warm showers for the women’s prison. At the time of my visit, the women were bathing outside with cold water, relying on other inmates to hold up sheets around them so that they could not be seen by the guards who stood on the tops of the buildings. After my visit, another organization had provided funds for a building for them to shower in, but there was no money for water heaters. Those heaters were very much needed in the brutally cold winters and them women were so grateful to have them.
OneMaker also provided sewing lessons for all 44 women prisoners for three months and sponsorships for three prisoners that included equipment they could take with them when they left the prison.
Strangely, as we left the prison, our van was hit by a motorcycle. After it was determined that he was okay – these things happened quite frequently there – and perhaps, after giving him a sum of money, we were on our way again. Then just minutes later our driver accidentally drove into a culvert. Thankfully 8 men appeared from out of nowhere to rock us out of it and we were on our way again.
Woman Unjustly Imprisoned Receives Sewing Equipment from OneMaker
What happened to Sharon? Tamana wrote a letter on her behalf and she was able to go to the women’s shelter. On her release from prison, as one of the women sponsored in our One by One Sponsorship program, she was awarded sewing equipment provided by her sponsor in the U.S.
While at the prison, we appealed to the Prison Director to allow these NGO workers to start offering English and sewing classes. He agreed, but then later denied them access though they returned more than once. Sadly, the prisoners missed out on the pleasure of having visitors from outside their own culture and opportunity to learn English, a valuable skill in an Afghanistan where NGOs provided the best paid employment. Thankfully, the women were at least allowed to take sewing classes with a local instruction with funds provided by OneMaker.
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