Taliban issues new laws restricting women's clothing, men's appearance and media

The 35-article document is the first formal declaration of the vice and virtue laws since the Taliban takeover

According to the Taliban, the newly enforced measures are necessary to promote virtue and prevent vice. EPA

The Taliban has issued a ban on women showing their faces in public under a new law to "combat vice and promote virtue", ratified by the group's supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada.

Woman’s voices are deemed intimate and so should not be heard singing, reciting, or reading aloud in public.

The Ministry for Vice and Virtue was created after the Taliban took over Afghanistan in 2021, two decades after being removed from power.

The Associated Press said it had seen a 114-page document that includes the laws covered by the ministry, featuring 35 articles such as Afghan women's hijab, men's clothing and rules in the media.

They are the first formal declaration of vice and virtue laws in Afghanistan since the takeover.

The ministry's role is to "command the good and forbid the evil in accordance with Sharia and Hanafi jurisprudence," Tolo News reported, citing Ministry of Justice spokesman Barkatullah Rasooli.

Article 13 mentions women's mandatory covering of their faces "for fear of causing temptation".

Women should also keep their voices low "as part of their modesty", the law says, and are prohibited from travelling alone with a male driver without a legal male guardian to accompany them.

Afghan media is under scrutiny as covered by article 17, which entails that disseminated content should comply with Sharia and "should not humiliate or insult Muslims", or "contain images of living beings", Tolo reported.

Men are prohibited from wearing a tie, trimming or shaving their beards to a certain length and "forming friendships and aiding non-believers".

“Inshallah, we assure you that this Islamic law will be of great help in the promotion of virtue and the elimination of vice,” the ministry's spokesman Maulvi Abdul Ghafar Farooq said.