The Taliban in Afghanistan cut women's pay for public sector jobs

Female government workers have been forced to stay home since the Taliban seized power in Afghanistan, and authorities this month cut their salaries.

Finance Ministry spokesman Ahmad Wali Haqmal said Monday that female workers who stay at home instead of going to the office will be paid 5,000 Afghanis a month. Women who are allowed to work in quarantine areas, such as government hospitals or schools, will continue to be paid according to their position.

Previously, female public sector workers in Afghanistan, including university professors forced off campus, were paid a maximum of about 35,000 Afghanis.

Women in administrative positions in various ministries receive a salary of about 20,000 Afghanis. But after the Taliban seized power, many women's salaries fell to about 15,000 Afghanis.

A 25-year-old woman, who declined to be named for security reasons and has been working at the Ministry of Information and Culture since early 2021, said her salary had been cut from 10,000 Afghanis.

"Keeping women at home is already a very big problem for us - our mental and psychological situation is very bad - and now that our wages have been cut, it's only going to get worse," she said.

The woman's salary supports her family of seven, including her sick mother, and she says it is only enough to survive for two weeks.

A spokesman for Afghanistan's finance ministry said the wage change, which took effect in July, is estimated to affect tens of thousands of women working in the public sector.

Since returning to power in 2021, Taliban authorities have restricted women's freedoms under a strict interpretation of Sharia law that the United Nations has called "gender segregation." Women were excluded from public life, including being denied access to education, public parks, gyms and bathrooms.