Islamic world worried about Taliban’s interpretation of Islam: Report

The Islamic world is worried about the Taliban’s interpretation of Islam as it poses political challenges. The Taliban has enforced Sharia laws based on their own interpretation of Islam, according to Dubai-based media network Al Arabiya Post.

Taliban leaders, however, insist that their policies are based on Islamic jurisprudence.

Columnist Mohammed Amir Rana, writing for the Dawn newspaper, claimed that Pakistan is among those Muslim countries that have distanced themselves from the Afghan Taliban’s conception and enforcement of Islamic laws.

The ideological influence of the Taliban, a hard-line Sunni organization in Pakistan, is today visible in the form of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). Every step that the Taliban has taken to enforce Sharia and make the women of Afghanistan outcasts in their own land, pushes Pakistan further away from its historical links with the Taliban much to its discomfort, according to Al Arabiya Post.

Even the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), took notice of the Taliban’s actions against Afghan women and reminded the Taliban to mend its ways.

The 57 OIC member countries in December 2022, held a special meeting on Afghanistan and urged the Taliban to abide by the “principles and purposes” enshrined in the United Nations Charter.

The OIC also called on the Taliban to reconsider the “un-Islamic” ban on women’s education and launched a campaign to teach the Taliban the real Islam that encourages education for women, according to the Al Arabiya Post.

It said that the OIC Executive Committee, headed by Saudi Arabia, met again in January 2023 to discuss Afghanistan. The meeting inter alia recalled that “the right of women and girls to access all levels of education, including university level, is a fundamental right in keeping with the teachings of the noble Islamic shariah”.

The Taliban’s ban on women’s education contradicted Islamic law, according to the Grand Imam of Egypt’s Al-Azhar University.

According to the Al Arabiya Post, the Islamic world is thus rightly worried about the Taliban’s interpretation of Islam as it poses a political challenge. Today, many Islamic societies have developed compatibility with modern values of freedom and human rights. However, the Taliban leaders insist that their policies are based on Islamic jurisprudence.

Earlier, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Tuesday called on the Taliban in Afghanistan to reverse the ban on girls’ access to secondary and higher education.

Calling education a fundamental right, Guterres said that now is the time for all nations to ensure actual steps to develop welcoming and inclusive learning environments for all.

“Now is also the time to end all discriminatory laws and practices that hinder access to education. I call on the de facto authorities in Afghanistan in particular to reverse the outrageous and self-defeating ban on access to secondary and higher education for girls,” the official spokesperson of the UN Secretary-General has said. (ANI)