EU sanctions several officials for violence against women and girls

Shortly before International Women's Day, the European Union imposed sanctions for violence against women and girls for the first time. The punitive measures are aimed, among other things, at ministers of the radical Islamic Taliban in Afghanistan and at high-ranking Russian military and police officers, according to the sanctions list presented to the AFP news agency in Brussels on Tuesday. Overall, the EU is imposing asset and entry bans on nine responsible persons and three institutions.

The sanctions are aimed, among others, at the Afghan Minister for Higher Education, Neda Mohammed Nadim, and the Minister for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice, Sheikh Muhammad Chalid Hanafi. The EU accuses the two members of the radical Islamic Taliban of oppressing women and girls and systematically keeping them away from schools and universities.

Among other things, the Russian military and police officers are said to have suppressed women's protests against the Ukraine war and, in some cases, used sexual violence against women demonstrators. Those responsible from Sudan and Myanmar as well as a women's prison in Iran are also on the sanctions list, which should come into force on Tuesday with publication in the EU Official Journal.

"It is the first time that the EU is standing up for the victims of sexual violence in the world," said the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which claims to represent a feminist foreign policy. Foreign Minister Wopke Hoekstra was convinced that the sanctions would have a deterrent effect on other possible violent criminals.