Taliban: Female hairdressers will be arrested if they continue to operate.
The Guardian newspaper reported that the Taliban have issued a new order warning female hairdressers to stop operating clandestine beauty salons within a month, otherwise they will face arrest.
This measure comes after the Taliban officially closed all beauty salons in August 2023; A decision that led to the closure of 12,000 businesses and the loss of more than 50,000 women’s jobs.
The Taliban have reportedly ordered lawyers to identify clandestine hair salons and report their owners to the Amr-e-Maruf administration.
Many women, however, see these salons as their only source of income and a way for their families to survive. Fereshta, a 38-year-old mother of three, told the Guardian that she has been forced to continue working secretly despite the bans because her husband is ill and she is the sole breadwinner.
Since the Taliban returned to power in August 2021, women have been excluded from most formal jobs and girls have been barred from continuing their secondary and university education.
Human rights groups have called the restrictions “gender apartheid” and warned that the Taliban are effectively excluding women from public life.
