Afghanistan’s top female cop is on the run after suffering a ‘brutal beating’ from the Taliban, Mail Online reports.
The female cop’s brutal beating is the latest proof that the Islamists’ harsh rule has returned.
Gulafroz Ebtekar was a deputy head of criminal investigations in Afghanistan’s Interior Ministry and is viewed as a role model for Afghan women.
Ebtekar was singled out by the Taliban as a target at the gates outside Kabul airport, where she spent five nights trying to secure a spot on an evacuation flight, Mail Online reports.
“I sent messages to the embassies of many countries to save myself and my family, but all to no avail,” Ebtekar said.
Ebtekar, believed to be 34years of age, is the first woman in Afghanistan to graduate from a police academy with a master’s degree.
She detailed her experience in Kabul airport, adding that she found US troops and believed they were helping her to fly abroad with her boyfriend and family members.
“We got to the refugee camp where the Americans were stationed,” Ebtekar said. “When the American soldiers were already near, I exhaled, I thought we were finally safe.”
“I speak a little English,” she continued. “I explained that it was not safe for us to remain in Kabul. They checked our documents. I had my ID, passport, and police certificates with me.”
“We were asked, where do you want to go?” she continued. “I replied, it doesn’t matter, to a safe country where there is a chance we may survive.”
“They looked at me and answered quite impudently,” she said. “And they asked one soldier to show us the way. I thought they would escort us to a plane or provide security.”
Ebtekar said that the soldier first escorted her to a crowded street where there was a terrorist attack.
“We did not want to leave, then the soldier raised his weapon and said get out of here,” Ebtekar said. “So we went out onto the road. At that moment, I didn’t want to live anymore.”
Ebtekar had studied for a master’s degree at a top police academy in Russia, but the Moscow embassy also declined to help because she didn’t have a residency or a Russian passport.
“I had dreamed of changing life in Afghanistan,” Ebtekar told East2West. “First, when it comes to women in the police. And I did it.”
“When I returned to my homeland, I got a job in the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and soon got a rather high position,” she said. “I became Deputy Chief for Criminal Investigations of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Afghanistan.”
After being declined any help from the airport, Ebtekar went home only to be told by her mother that the Taliban came for her while she was out.
Ebtekar then moved to the first of three apartments she has used to try and stay out of the hands of the Taliban.
When Ebtekar tried to escape to Kabul airport again, the Taliban guards found her and beat her with ‘weapons and stones’.
Ebtekar’s former female colleagues in the police have asked her ‘what’s going to happen to us’ but she has no answers.
“I spoke on television, spoke out on social networks, fought against extremism, terrorism, advocated for the rights of women and children, and believed in the best for our country,” Ebtekar said.
Ebtekar added that her ‘former life’ was gone and that six months ago, she’d been ‘warned’ by the Taliban about her job.
“The Taliban wrote me letters in which they said that I should not work in the police, that I had no right to declare about women’s rights,” Ebtekar said.
“What are women’s rights? Why do you publish your photos on Facebook and Instagram?” Ebtekar said. “These are the comments I received from them a year or six months ago. And now they are in power.”
“I think the Taliban will never change,” Ebtekar warned. “They will not agree for a woman to work, participate in public life, and be free.”
“When the Taliban came to Kabul 20 years ago, they made the same promises as now for two months,” Ebtekar said. “And then they created their own state, their own courts, beat and killed people. For me, this is the most dangerous group of terrorists.”
“I was the first woman in Afghanistan to graduate from a police academy with a master’s degree and hold such a high position,” Ebtekar continued. “After me, about 4,000 Afghan women entered police universities. I’m not afraid to speak openly, because I have nothing left.”
“The state of Afghanistan no longer exists, there is no freedom,” Ebtekar said. “All the time I fought to maintain a normal life in the country.”
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