Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) resumed operations in southern Kandahar province after the Afghan female staff received temporary permission to work with the organization.
Last month, the General Secretary of the Norwegian Refugee Council said that the Taliban’s senior leaders in Kandahar province have shown a willingness to temporarily agree to the work of female aid workers.
According to the Reuters news agency, Jan Egeland, NRC Chief on Monday said, “I’m glad to confirm that we have resumed our humanitarian operation in Kandahar and other parts of Afghanistan.”
“All our activities and support programs are humanitarian for men, women, girls and boys, with equal participation of male and female employees,” Jan Egeland said on Twitter.
The de facto authorities of Afghanistan barred Afghan female employees from working with the non-governmental aid organizations and the United Nations agencies in two separate orders.
The UN and humanitarian aid organizations were trying to find an exception to deliver life-saving aid for women, particularly, in the areas of education and health.
In the past months, the Taliban authorities had promised to provide a set of written instructions for aid groups so that local female staff could work with these organizations but has not been provided so far.
The recent development comes as Norway will host a forum on the situation of Afghanistan in its capital, Oslo, in the near future, in which representatives from around the world will discuss Afghanistan issues.
Besides facing widespread criticism within Afghanistan and from the international community, the Taliban administration has banned secondary school and university education for female Afghan students for nearly the past two years.
