“Western Agenda”: Taliban ban sale of birth control, report says

The Taliban have reportedly shut down contraceptive sales in at least two major cities in Afghanistan, using threats and intimidation to further restrict access and undermine the rights of women in the country.

“They came into my shop twice with guns and threatened not to sell contraceptive pills,” a shopkeeper in one of the cities told the Guardian. “They regularly check every pharmacy in Kabul and we have stopped selling the products.”

The government has not issued any official policy or statement on the matter, but that has allegedly not stopped Taliban fighters from visiting shops or health workers in the cities of Kabul and Mazar-i-Sharif that would directly offer or promote the use of contraceptives .

Taliban fighters have reportedly claimed that contraceptive use and family planning are part of a “Western agenda” aimed at controlling the Muslim population.

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Suhail Shaheen, head of the Doha political bureau, told Fox News Digital he was not aware of any such restrictions, suggesting it could instead be “a rumour, as happens all the time”.

A pedestrian stands next to begging women waiting to cross a street in front of a pharmaceutical wholesale market July 12, 2020 in Kabul, Afghanistan. (Jim Huylebroek/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

One midwife, who was not named, said the Taliban had threatened her on several occasions, telling her she “must not go out and promote the Western concept of population control and that it is unnecessary work.”

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Another shopkeeper told The Guardian that militants decreed that “items such as birth control pills and Depo-Provera injections may no longer be stored in the pharmacy as of earlier this month”. The store owner said he was too scared to try to sell his existing stock.

Two men attend to a pharmacy as Afghans go about their daily lives in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif, Afghanistan November 10, 2015. (Scott Peterson/Getty Images)

The new policy would be the latest in a series of measures the Taliban have taken to restrict women’s rights in the country, beginning with access to education: The Afghan government banned women from university education after Fox News’ Trey Yingst informed that “all citizens of Afghanistan” had the right to education.

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“All citizens of Afghanistan, regardless of gender, have a right to education” under the government’s “clear” policy, a Taliban spokesman said in August 2022. The Taliban also restricted access for girls to attend middle and high school.

A customer buys medicines at a pharmacy in Kabul, Afghanistan, September 29, 2020. (Xinhua/Sayed Mominzadah via Getty Images)

Women were also barred from certain areas of employment, as well as public areas such as parks and gyms.

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UN Women, the United Nations agency dedicated to promoting gender equality and women’s empowerment, has not responded to a Fox News Digital request for comment as of press time.

Fox News Digital’s Elizabeth Heckman contributed to this report.