A Female Cat Has More Freedoms Than A Woman In Afghanistan: Meryl Streep

American actress Meryl Streep criticised the Taliban's edicts in Afghanistan, which have "stripped women of their education and employment, freedom of expression and movement." She was speaking at an event of the United Nations.

"Today in Kabul, a female cat has more freedoms than a woman. A cat may go sit on the front porch and feel the sun on her face; she may chase a squirrel in the park. A squirrel has more rights than a girl in Afghanistan because the public parks are closed to women and girls by the Taliban," the Academy Award-winning actor said.

The Permanent Missions of Ireland, Indonesia, Switzerland and Qatar hosted a high-level event on the situation of women and girls in Afghanistan in partnership with the Women's Forum on Afghanistan.

It was hosted by former Swedish Foreign Minister Margot Wallström. It also included remarks from UN Secretary-General António Guterres, who said Afghanistan will never take its rightful place on the global stage if it does not recognise the rights of half of its population.

Streep also criticised the laws barring women from singing in public, calling the edicts "odd" and a "suppression of natural law."

"A bird may sing in Kabul, but a girl may not, and a woman may not in public," she said.

She spoke about how women in Afghanistan received the right to vote in 1919 and compared it to how women in Switzerland had received that same right in 1971.

"In the 70s, most of the civil servants were women; over half the teachers were doctors; there were women jurists and lawyers in every profession."

Streep expressed solidarity with her "sisters in Afghanistan" and all of those who had to leave their country. She encourages the world community (especially those who continue to do business with Afghanistan) to intervene on their behalf.

The current administration has effectively "incarcerated half their population,"  Streep said.

"I believe the international community, as a whole, if they came together, could affect change in Afghanistan and stop the slow suffocation of half the population who are incarcerated," Streep said.

Streep also presented a shortened version of a documentary called 'The Sharp Edge Of Peace', about four Afghan women leaders who held peace talks with the Taliban in 2020 in Doha, Qatar.

"They encourage us and they remind us that the distorted fundamentalist fear of the future can upend a civilisation from the inside," Streep said.

The screening was followed by an interactive panel discussion, including women who participated in the intra-Afghan talks in 2020 and those currently engaged on the ground in Afghanistan.