Among the many areas where the Afghan government has pathetically failed to bring about any significant development one is the right of women and safeguarding them from brutal violence. For centuries the rights of women have been suppressed and Taliban's era 1996-2001 proved to be the worst for them as they were imprisoned in their own home deprived of their basic rights, such as access to education, work or health services. They were treated worse than animals.

Meanwhile, more than a decade after the ouster of Taliban from government, it seems like their rules, laws and regulations still apply in many parts of Afghanistan and the people are compelled to follow them by hook or crook. Over the last decade – an era considered with return of democracy -, the world has witnessed heart-wrenching incidents of violence against women. Women have been attacked with acid on their faces and their body parts have been chopped off. They have been brutally beaten and publically executed. At the same time, the trend of poisoning schoolgirls has gotten pace in the recent months.

Recently, one more incident of brutality against women has occurred in Parwan province just a few kilometers away from Kabul. According to Afghan officials a member of the Taliban, last week, shot dead a woman accused of adultery in front of a crowd in the village of Qimchok of Shinwari district. The video obtained by media and available on the internet shows how the Taliban practice their so called Shariah in an area lying close to the capital of Afghanistan. In the three-minute video, a turban-clad man approaches a woman kneeling in the dirt and shoots her five times at close range with an automatic rifle, to cheers of jubilation from the 150 or so men watching the execution.

This is a clear challenge to Afghan government's writ who has been claiming drastic improvement in living condition of Afghan women. The only body that should deal with the cases such as that mentioned above is the Afghan judiciary. However, time and again public executions of women by Taliban establish the fact that rule of law is extremely poor in Afghanistan.

Taliban's violence against women continues as the Afghan government is eyeing to involve them in Afghanistan's main political stream through the so-called peace and reconciliation program. Once that happens, there are serious concerns that the little achievement the Afghan women have had in the last decade will be at the risk of being lost.