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UN urged by female Afghan delegate to let women help rebuild the country

An Afghan woman delegate urged the UN on Tuesday to assure a major role for women in efforts to help rebuild Afghanistan if the ruling Taliban are driven from power.

"I have often heard that Afghan women are not political, that peace and security is man's work. I am here to challenge that notion," said Jamila, a founding member of the Afghan Women's Network, an umbrella organization of 300 Afghan women's groups.

"For the last 20 years of my life, the leadership of men has only brought war and suffering," Jamila told a special meeting of the UN Security Council. Like many Afghans she has only one name.

Jamila was part of a delegation of women diplomats and activists to address the 15-nation council on the role of women in nations torn by conflict. Others came from East Timor in South Asia and Yugoslavia's Kosovo province, where UN peacekeeping missions are active.

Afghanistan's ruling Taliban have kept women veiled and out of public life, barring them from holding jobs or getting an education.

But Jamila, who left Afghanistan 14 years ago and now serves as a relief worker at an Afghan refugee camp in neighboring Pakistan, argued that women and girls made up 54 percent of her country's population and merited "an active role in rebuilding the future of our country."

"When the UN is looking for leaders, look to us," she told reporters after meeting council diplomats.

"Do not think that because women wear a veil, we do not have a voice."

The delegation of women made similar demands last week during a meeting with UN special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, who has been asked by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan to help build a broad-based government in Afghanistan to replace the Taliban.
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