UN Rights Chief Warns of Deepening Rights and Humanitarian Crisis in Afghanistan

Overview

• UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk warned on 9 September that a "deafening" global silence is letting the de facto authorities tighten repressive measures and abandon millions to growing hardship.
• The UN says more than 2.2 million Afghan girls and women have been denied secondary and higher education since 2021, a policy it calls part of an institutionalized system amounting to "gender apartheid."
• UN agencies report over 400,000 forced returns mainly from Iran and Pakistan, with many returnees entering Afghanistan for the first time and facing severe shortages of food, water, health care and work.
• The UN recorded at least 449 cases of corporal punishment in the first half of 2026 and documents arrests by the Office for the Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice for dress, beard length and music while new 2026 decrees restrict women's ability to separate from spouses.
• International accountability measures such as ICC arrest warrants and tribunal findings exist but aid shortfalls and limited enforcement have reduced services and prompted the UN to call for renewed diplomatic pressure and scaled humanitarian funding.