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ISLAMABAD —A Taliban-controlled state broadcaster in Afghanistan silenced a female journalist and her image during a live media event Tuesday, apparently in compliance with the radical rulers' recently enacted morality law that bans women from speaking or showing their faces in public.
Officials of the de facto Taliban interior ministry organized a news conference in Kabul to share their annual performance before taking questions from around 10 journalists, including a woman.
The RTA broadcaster aired the voices and images of all male reporters without interruption. However, when the female journalist from the local Ariana news channel started asking a question, the broadcast abruptly went silent for the next minute or so until she finished, and the focus remained on Taliban officials instead.
The channel's audio was unmuted when ministry representatives started answering her query and those asked by others subsequently until the event ended.
No official explanation was provided for interrupting the female reporter's voice. VOA tried to contact RTA officials via the WhatsApp platform but did not receive a response as usual because the Taliban have banned the media outlet in Afghanistan and do not respond to its queries.
Tuesday's muting of the female reporter's voice has raised concerns it could mark the first public enforcement of the contentious morality law promulgated by the Taliban last Wednesday, sparking international outrage.
The so-called "Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice" decree forbids women from singing, reciting poetry, or speaking aloud in public and requires them to keep their faces and entire bodies always covered when outdoors in line with the Taliban's interpretation of Islamic law, or Sharia.
The legal document argues that a woman's voice is intimate and should not be heard publicly. They are also not allowed to look at men they are not related to by blood or marriage and vice versa, nor can taxi drivers transport a woman to any destination unless a male guardian accompanies her.
The 35-article law imposes severe restrictions on the personal freedom of Afghan men and women and empowers the Taliban Ministry of Vice and Virtue to enforce it.
Roza Otunbayeva, the head of the U.N. Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, or UNAMA, condemned the morality law on Sunday as a "distressing vision" of the country's future.
"It extends the already intolerable restrictions on the rights of Afghan women and girls, with even the sound of a female voice outside the home apparently deemed a moral violation," stated Otunbayeva.
She noted, "Moral inspectors have discretionary powers to threaten and detain anyone based on broad and sometimes vague lists of infractions" under the Taliban rule.
In a formal response on Monday, the Taliban expressed outrage at what they denounced as "uncalled for objections" by the UNAMA and Western governments to their vice and virtue laws.
"Non-Muslims expressing concerns over these laws or rejecting them should first educate themselves about Islamic laws and respect Islamic values," asserted Zabihullah Mujahid, the spokesperson for the Taliban government, which is not recognized by any country.
"We consider it insulting to our Islamic Sharia (law) when they raise such objections without understanding it," Mujahid stated.
The Taliban introduced the morality law against the backdrop of their wide-ranging restrictions on female members of Afghan society. Since returning to power three years ago, the radical de facto rulers have banned girls from attending school beyond the sixth grade and women from working in most fields as well as taking part in public activities at large.
"After decades of war and in the midst of a terrible humanitarian crisis, the Afghan people deserve much better than being threatened or jailed if they happen to be late for prayers, glance at a member of the opposite sex who is not a family member, or possess a photo of a loved one," Otunbayeva said.
The morality law also prohibits the broadcasting and publication of images of living beings, as well as content believed to violate Sharia or insult Muslims under the Taliban's interpretation of Islam.
Rosemary DiCarlo, the U.N. undersecretary-general for political and peacebuilding affairs, has warned that the morality decree "is unconscionable, and if maintained, the law can only impede Afghanistan's return to the international fold."
No country has recognized the Taliban as the legitimate government of Afghanistan, primarily over their harsh treatment of women.