HOW TALIBAN WRECKED KABUL
TUESDAY, 18 SEPTEMBER, 2001
By MARTIN PHILLIPS
IN five short and bloody years the Taliban regime has made Afghanistan the most repressive country on the planet.
The party of religious fanatics rule over what fundamental extremists regard as the ideal of an Islamic state - Khilafah.
In truth, it is hell on earth.
Ravaged by two decades of war and the worst drought for 30 years, up to five million people - a quarter of the population - face starvation. It is reckoned that every hour in Afghanistan 14 people die from hunger or war. More than one million are homeless.
In this joyless land, bars and theatres in the capital Kabul have been boarded up because they are deemed a threat to public morals. The Taliban, who swept to power in September 1996, ending four years of infighting between rival Mujahideen factions, regard the multi-ethnic city as a den of iniquity and so have their headquarters in Kandahar.
Under their law, Afghanistan has no television or cinemas and newspapers cannot print pictures
Music and dance are forbidden and so is the internet.
Women must wear a chadri - a shroud - that covers them from head to foot and "noisy" or "light-coloured" shoes are banned, as is nail varnish.
They are also not allowed to attend school. Women who are educated abroad can only work in health care. Muslim men are forced to grow beards and to avoid arrest the length must be at least the width of a hand.
Long hair is banned and pubic hair and hair under the armpits must be shaved.
Prayer is enforced five times a day by the brutal black-turbaned religious police.
Flying a kite is illegal. So is playing chess and boxing. Boys cannot play with toy soldiers and girls cannot own a doll.
Moral "crimes" are fiercely prosecuted, with adultery, prostitution, blasphemy and homosexuality all punishable by death.
People don't go to the local football stadium to watch soccer, they go to watch the victims of this "justice" shot dead on the penalty spot or hanged from the goalposts.
A CNN reporter told how the last time the stadium was used for a match, the Pakistan team were thrown in jail and had their hair cropped short as punishment for wearing shorts.
Other criminals are hanged from cranes in front of huge crowds in the main square of Kabul's presidential palace. Gays have walls pushed on them and are crushed by a bulldozer. Starving men have their hands cut off for stealing bread. The Taliban has done little to repair the ravages of war.
The roads are pot-holed, many buildings are still burned out shells and the country is littered with landmines which daily maim and kill people going about their lives.
The national museum, once filled with treasures, was looted and stands empty in a wasteland that used to be beautiful parkland.
Children play in deserted animal pens in the zoo and swim in the filthy water of what was the flamingo pool.
In March the Taliban showed their contempt for other cultures by blowing up two giant 1,500-year-old Buddha statues for being blasphemous.
In May they announced that the country's Hindus would have to wear yellow badges to denote their religion - a chilling reminder of the yellow stars the Nazis forced Jews to wear.
The same month an Italian-funded 120-bed hospital offering rare medical facilities was closed and doctors and staff beaten by Taliban police - all because male and female doctors were allowed to share a dining room.
In June, Taliban troops recaptured the central town of Yakowlang - home to 60,000 people - from the opposition United Front rebels and burned every building to the ground.
British-born journalist Saira Shah, 36, whose father was an Afghan, went undercover to the country to make a film.
She said: "I found a people in despair. There was little medical treatment for women and no infrastructure. Just ruins."
She told how one little girl hid in a bread oven while the Taliban robbed and shot her father and how a pregnant woman was beaten so badly she lost her baby - just because her veil was the wrong colour.
Last month eight Western aid workers were jailed, accused of spreading Christianity - a crime punishable by death.