[Sharbat Gula, whose haunting
portrait was featured by the magazine more than three decades ago, was
evacuated to Rome after the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan.]
By Jenny Gross
Ever since the
U.S. pulled out of Afghanistan in August, nonprofit organizations had
appealed for help in evacuating Ms. Gula, the Italian government said in a
statement.
“The prime minister’s office has
brought about and organized her transfer to Italy,” the statement said. It did
not say when she arrived, and the foreign ministry later said it did not know
whether she would remain in Italy or go elsewhere.
Ms. Gula, now in her late 40s and
the mother of several children, was believed to be 12 when Steve McCurry
photographed her, with a piercing, green-eyed stare, in 1984 in a refugee camp
in Pakistan. He did not learn her name until 2002, when he found her in the
mountains of Afghanistan and was able to verify her identity.
A 2002 National Geographic article about Mr. McCurry’s
search for her described the adult Ms. Gula: “Time and hardship had erased her
youth. Her skin looks like leather. The geometry of her jaw has softened. The
eyes still glare; that has not softened.”
In 2016, Ms. Gula was
deported from Pakistan after being arrested on charges of obtaining
false identity documents, a common practice among Afghans in Pakistan. Human
rights groups condemned the Pakistani government for sending her back to
Afghanistan. On her arrival, the Afghan president at the time, Ashraf Ghani,
gave her a warm welcome and provided her with a government-funded apartment.
In August, Taliban leaders moved
into the presidential palace that had been occupied by Mr. Ghani. Their
takeover once again displaced hundreds of thousands of Afghans. Pakistan braced
for as
many as 700,000 refugees. Italy has evacuated more than 5,000 people from
Kabul, the government said.
In the United States, more than
22,500 Afghan refugees have been resettled as of Nov. 19, including
3,500 in one week in October. About 42,500 more remain in temporary housing on
eight military bases around the country while they wait for housing.
Until the Taliban takeover, the
rights of Afghan women had been expanding. Afghan girls were going to
school and getting college degrees, and more were participating in civic life.
But under the first few months of the Taliban’s conservative rule, women have
already faced new restrictions, like not being allowed to play sports. The
Taliban have severely
restricted education for women, and Taliban gunmen have gone
door-to-door in some neighborhoods looking for anyone who supported
the American efforts in the country.
Heather Barr, the associate
director for women’s rights at Human Rights Watch, said that it was a
particularly dangerous time to be a high-profile woman in Afghanistan. She said
there had been cases of prominent women being threatened or intimidated, or
feeling like they had no choice but to stay in hiding or change locations
constantly to avoid attention.
“The Taliban don’t want women to be
visible, and she’s an extremely visible Afghan woman,” Ms. Barr said of Ms.
Gula.
Gaia Pianigiani contributed
reporting from Rome.
