The European Union has long positioned itself as a global champion of human rights, democracy, gender equality, and the rule of law. These principles have shaped its foreign policy and underpinned its criticism of governments and non-state actors that violate fundamental freedoms. Reports that the EU recently invited Taliban representatives to Brussels and issued visas to several Taliban officials for discussions on migration and deportation coordination, therefore raise a troubling question: can the EU credibly defend these values while engaging, on official terms, with a regime responsible for one of the world’s most systematic assaults on the human rights of women and girls?
Governments often engage with de facto authorities for various reasons, but diplomacy should not come at the expense of principle. By welcoming Taliban officials to Brussels without publicly conditioning that engagement on measurable human rights improvements, the EU risks sending the message that geopolitical priorities can outweigh accountability for grave abuses. It also risks legitimizing the Taliban’s system of gender apartheid and the systematic erosion of fundamental human rights.
Since returning to power in 2021, the Taliban have imposed more than 160 decrees, directives, and laws restricting the lives of women and girls. They have banned girls from secondary schools and universities, prohibited many forms of employment, severely restricted women’s freedom of movement without a male guardian, enforced increasingly restrictive dress codes, and systematically erased women from public life. Some of these restrictions are so far-reaching that women are effectively prevented from speaking publicly or participating in society – even with other women. The Feminist Majority Foundation, United Nations experts, and numerous human rights organizations have documented these measures as a system of institutionalized gender discrimination and have called for the recognition of gender apartheid under international law.
The concern extends beyond symbolism. Granting visas and providing diplomatic access inevitably confers a degree of legitimacy on Taliban officials, despite the fact that the Taliban have not been recognized by much of the international community as the legitimate government of Afghanistan. Engagement that is not accompanied by clear human rights benchmarks risks weakening international efforts to hold the Taliban accountable for ongoing abuses.
The focus of these discussions is also troubling. Negotiating migration and deportation policies with the very authorities whose repression has forced millions of Afghans to flee raises profound ethical and practical concerns. Beyond the systematic persecution of women and girls, the Taliban have arbitrarily detained, tortured, and killed former government officials, journalists, activists, and members of civil society. Their policies have contributed to deepening poverty, widespread unemployment, and one of the world’s largest humanitarian crises. Pursuing migration agreements without addressing these root causes risks treating the symptoms of the crisis rather than its causes. Any assumption that Afghanistan is broadly safe for return is therefore deeply flawed and risks ignoring the reality on the ground. Afghanistan remains unsafe for anyone who opposes the Taliban’s policies, and forced returns would expose them to persecution, arbitrary detention, and other serious human rights abuses.
Any engagement with the Taliban should be grounded in clear and public conditions that prioritize the protection of fundamental human rights, particularly the rights of women and girls, and include measurable expectations, transparency, and accountability. Without those safeguards, diplomatic engagement risks becoming a form of normalization that confers legitimacy on the Taliban’s system of gender apartheid.
For Afghan women – and for the Afghan people more broadly – the stakes are far greater than diplomatic engagement. They are about whether the EU and its partners are prepared to stand consistently for human rights and gender equality, or selectively apply those principles when political interests intervene. Continuing to engage without considering the broader implications risks legitimizing a system of institutionalized oppression that the EU and the international community have a responsibility to challenge, not accommodate.