by Emmanuel Duparcq Emmanuel Duparcq – Sun Apr 3, 4:41 pm ET
KHOSHKAK, Afghanistan (AFP) – Villagers in a tiny mountain hamlet in Afghanistan's Bamiyan Valley saw a remarkable thing recently -- a group of women putting on skis.
The men and children of Khoshak, tucked at the snow-covered foot of the Koh-e-Baba peaks, could hardly tear their eyes off the 10 women in headscarves and long coats laughing as they wrestled with their poles and bindings.
Here most women won't even leave the house without a full veil covering their faces.
"Women skiing? I'm against it if they do it without the burqa," declared Afzal, as he fingered his prayer beads, clearly unconvinced by what he called this "Western thing".
Nando Rollando, an Italian instructor charged by the Aga Khan Foundation (AKF) with running the first skiing lessons the area has ever seen, expected this kind of resistance.
He had no trouble finding a dozen or so local boys keen to tackle the slopes, but when he suggested doing a special lesson for women with the local UN mission, he was met with reluctance, even among his colleagues.
"One of them told me he would send his son to ski but not his daughter. That dampened my enthusiasm," he said.
One of his best pupils from Khoshak, 13-year-old Said Shah, watched the women skiing from behind his flashy sunglasses.
But while he was happy to show off his fake designer shades on the slopes, he was clear that the women should dress more demurely.
"If women are interested (in skiing) they have to put hijab (burqa) or at least to cover their face," he said.
More than half of the women in the rural parts of this province -- regarded as among the country's least conservative -- wear the burqa, according to a UN official, but in the capital Bamiyan the figure drops to just over 20 percent.
The women learning to ski are the polar opposite of the rural women in blue burqas. Aged in their 20s and 30s, they are students or work in town and come from progressive families, according to the AKF.
On the slopes with Rollando, they fight through their apprehension and are soon shouting and laughing as they fall about on the snow.
"It's the first time I do something for myself," one said. Another said it had given her the chance to "discover herself".
For 28-year-old Zahra, the rough and tumble of the sport -- she fell over and hurt her back -- didn't stop her enjoying herself.
"It is very difficult to control skis, but very exciting," she said.
Naz Dana, a timid 16-year-old in a golden yellow headscarf has had to put up with snide remarks about women skiing -- from women as well as men -- but she was clear that she thought the veil was both impractical and unnecessary.
"With a burqa, it would be impossible to see the piste," she said.
"Skiing can be done without a burqa and in accordance to Islamic regulations."
On the heights of Bamiyan, mullah Said Nasrullah Waezi agreed.
"If the woman is properly covered from toe to head, with a scarf, she does not need the burqa that the Taliban and Al-Qaeda want," he said.
"It is good if the coach is a woman, or a man who keeps his distance."
It's a compromise that volleyball, the most popular sport among young women in Bamiyan, has yet to find -- without a gym where they can play away from the gaze of men, the town has no team.
Source,
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20110403/wl_sthasia_afp/lifestyleafghanistansportski_20110403204127
The call came with the warning that they faced the risk of persecution or death if forced to return to their homeland.
The warning from William Maley, director of the Asia-Pacific College of Diplomacy at the Australian National University, is supported by research showing that at least nine Afghans deported when their asylum claims were rejected were killed after being forced to return to war-torn Afghanistan.
Professor Maley says the Gillard government's plan to repatriate a group of about 50 Afghans in coming months will put them in grave danger. Most of those facing forced removal are members of the ethnic Hazara minority, who have been persecuted by the Taliban, which controls large areas of the countryside.
"In Afghanistan, there is a pervasive fear, fuelled by Western politicians talking openly about the need to reconcile with the Taliban, that the country is heading back to the dark days before September 11, 2001," Professor Maley told The Australian.
"It is therefore no surprise that ethnic Hazaras, a group ferociously persecuted at that time, are desperate to escape.
"Unfortunately the Immigration Department's processing of refugee claims has become so haphazard there is a grave danger that people in need of protection might be thrown, metaphorically, to the wolves. There should be a moratorium on returning anyone to Afghanistan until the integrity of the assessment process can be properly guaranteed."
Immigration Minister Chris Bowen told The Australian last week his department was finalising arrangements for the repatriation of an initial group of about 50 Afghans in the coming months.
"I have grave fears for Afghans who are sent back," said Phil Glendenning, director of the Edmund Rice Centre, a Catholic group that has followed the fate of about 270 failed asylum-seekers, including nine Afghans who were killed after being sent home by the Howard government.
In one case documented by the centre, an ethnic Hazara man, Mohammed Hussain, was deported to Afghanistan in 2008 from Nauru, where he had been detained under the Howard-era Pacific Solution.
Mr Glendenning says Hussain, who had formerly been an anti-Taliban fighter, was kidnapped by Taliban forces and taken back to his home village in Afghanistan's Ghazni province.
"He was thrown down a well in front of 35 members of his family, and then they threw a grenade down and decapitated him," says Mr Glendenning, who met Hussain in Kabul in September 2008. He says Hussain expressed fears at the time that he would be killed..
In a second case, another deportee from Nauru, Abdul Azmin Rajabi, saw his daughters aged six and nine killed when the family was targeted four months after their return to Afghanistan.
"If the government can't guarantee their safety, they should not be returned,' Mr Glendenning told The Australian.
Professor Maley says the targeting of returnees is "more likely now than in 2008".
According to the UN, 2010 was the most violent year in Afghanistan since the war began, with 2777 civilians killed, three-quarters of them by insurgents.
The Taliban has stated that its policy is to exterminate the Hazara people.
Hundreds of Afghans, mostly Hazaras, could face deportation as about 50 per cent of Afghan asylum claims are now being rejected.