Mary Altaffer/AP Photo
- Fawzia Koofi was one of the first women in Afghanistan's parliament.
- Koofi was forced to leave Afghanistan after being put on house arrest in August.
- She plans to return: "I want to be relevant and be in Afghanistan and do things for my country."
After the Taliban regained control of Afghanistan after more than 20 years, this summer, Fawzia Koofi, one of the first women in the country's parliament and a women's rights activist, was placed on house arrest.
In an interview with Insider, Koofi said that while she wanted to stay in Afghanistan and boost morale for other women in the country, she ultimately decided to flee the country so she could better advocate for those who are still there.
"It has been an extremely difficult decision for me to leave everything that I have invested my time, my energy, and even my blood to leave that in that situation and to leave my country. It was not an easy decision," Koofi told Insider.
Koofi plans to one day return, but for now, she's raising awareness and remaining in contact with Afghans from abroad. She said she understands that, for observers, what's happening in the country may seem like just another humanitarian crisis but for her, it's personal.
"For me, it's more than a humanitarian case. It's my country, but the situation became very difficult because first of all being under house arrest is one thing. Second, I was not functioning. I was dysfunctional. The Taliban were not allowing me to get out of my home," she said. "I came with a hope that I will go back soon, but every day I try to operate from outside the same way that I was doing, of course not the same impact."
Koofi said Taliban security forces showed up at her home the day after they took over Kabul. She made attempts to leave as foreign countries were evacuating their citizens but was stopped.
"I came to this realization that I perhaps will be more effective when I'm abroad to talk and meet different leaders and tell them about the situation," she said.
Koofi was eventually able to flee, but said the details of her escape are sensitive.
The former parliament member was a part of the government team that was negotiating with the Taliban last year and has also been the target of several assassination attempts in her career. Last August, her right arm was wounded during one such attempt in the market in Qarabagh district, she said. The Taliban claimed they weren't responsible for that attack, The Guardian reported.
Afghans haven't been paid for months and want to leave
Koofi is still communicating with women in Afghanistan and coordinating women's organizations and protests. She told Insider she gets constant messages about the severity of the situation. She said many people have not been paid in months, and women, in particular, are getting frustrated just sitting at home without little access to education or employment.
Every day she hears from people looking to flee Afghanistan, which she said is concerning. Koofi said those looking to flee are the country's educated and professionals who are out of work or struggling to make ends meet because of the economic conditions. If they leave, she says, there will be no Afghanistan to go back to.
"We cannot bring millions of women out of the country. They need to live in that country. And if they leave that country, they need to have access to education, have access to political participation, to jobs, to income," Koofi said. "Now, the situation is very, very dire."
The Taliban's rule in the 1990s pushed Koofi into politics
Koofi said she lived under the Taliban's initial rule in the late 1990s and was personally impacted. While she wanted to be a medical doctor, she wasn't allowed to go to school when they were in power. Her husband was imprisoned by the Taliban and died in 2003 after contracting tuberculosis in prison.
"Everything that the Taliban did, I was a victim of that. Actually, that motivated me, I would say, to join politics and to change things for others," she said.
Koofi told Insider that while the Taliban has tried to maintain a "moderate image" this time around, for example, "behaving" as people protested, she said there are reports of pressure behind the scenes.
"There is forced disappearing. There is targeted killing of people who work with the previous government, especially the security. There is forced displacement of people. Obviously, we know that women could not go to school or do not go to work," Koofi said.
She's urging the international community to empower the Afghan people because without it she said they'll "lose Afghanistan."
The West needs to empower the people of Afghanistan
Koofi is concerned that the potential support of the Taliban from regional powers like China and Russia could lead to another cold war.
"The world must support the people of Afghanistan. These countries are not going to fill the vacuum of human rights and women rights that the west has created after their departures," she said, referring to the withdrawal of the US and UK.
Koofi also thinks western leaders and observers falsely assume the Taliban would work against ISIS and is concerned that members of the previous government are joining ISIS because they're the alternative to the Taliban.
"If the West's commentators and policymakers only think that Afghanistan's choice is between Daesh (ISIS) and Taliban, then definitely you're going to lose an empowered nation and empowered generation," Koofi said.
"There has been a seed of democracy cultivated in Afghanistan. Now there is winter and there is snow. That seed can survive if we nourish it in this winter and snow. If you don't, the seed is going to die, and then the consequences are going to be security-wise, even higher into the world."
Koofi doesn't want asylum because she intends to return to Afghanistan
For now, Koofi is working to secure asylum for her two daughters, but she's not seeking the same for herself. She did not specify where she will seek asylum for her daughters, citing security concerns.
She said getting asylum is a time-consuming, bureaucratic process that would leave little time for her to be able to meet with global leaders and groups to discuss Afghanistan or coordinate with people still in the country. However, Koofi said she's unsure how long she could keep that up before her funds run out. Koofi said countries taking in large numbers of Afghans should consider some kind of diplomatic asylum, that would allow people who migrate more freedom.
"So, personally I'm under a lot of difficulties but I'm hoping that things will become somehow clear so that I could return," she said.
She added: "I want to be relevant and be in Afghanistan and do things for my country."