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Life under Taliban rule

Things that are said to have been banned in parts of Afghanistan under the Taliban regime:

• Reading of particular books
• Keeping cameras without licence
• Cinema, television, and VCRs (decadent, used for watching pornography, promotes non-Muslim ideas)
• Internet (though users can log into uncensored ISPs in Pakistan)
• Music
• Promotion of non-Muslim ideas
• Women without complete body coverings
• Women working outside the home (except in health care when kept separate from male workers and patients)
• Women going on picnics or to tourist resorts
• Kite flying (wastes time, Hindu ritual)
• Women being pictured (whether on the printed page or on a frame)
• Women appearing on television or during public performances
• Converting people from Islam (death penalty for Afghan convert, expulsion for foreign national)
• Growing opium poppies
• Forecasting weather (see: Afghanistan Meteorological Authority)
• Although boxing was not banned, Afghan boxers were unable to compete internationally under Taliban rule, because the Taliban banned men from shaving their beards. International boxing rules require contestants to be clean-shaven.

Practices Reported in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan:

• Amputating the hands of thieves.
• Public executions
• Shooting of prostitutes in sport stadiums
• Shooting of murderers by victim's family, in sport stadium
• Hanging or throat cutting of robbers, in sport stadium
• Stoning of adulterous (married) couples
• Collapsing a wall over homosexuals
• Destroying ancient Buddhist statues prior to September 11, 2001
• On the advice on the Hindu community elders, who used to be disturbed by the police who thought them to be Muslims who had shaved their beards, on May 22, 2001, the Taliban issued an order that Hindus and other non-Muslims must wear a yellow identity symbol. This policy was replaced in June of the same year, by an order that Hindus were required to carry a special identification card.
• Muslim men were beaten or jailed for shaving or excessively cutting their beards
• Women were not permitted to wear see-through socks or shoes, nor to wear shoes that make noise when walking
• Women suffer physical punishment if showing face in public
• Houses with women present must have windows facing the street painted over so people outside would not be able to look inside.

See also: Life under Saudi rule