VZCZCXRO9295
PP RUEHDBU RUEHIK RUEHYG
DE RUEHBUL #0395/01 0371258
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 061258Z FEB 07
FM AMEMBASSY KABUL
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 5953
INFO RUCNAFG/AFGHANISTAN COLLECTIVE
RUEHZG/NATO EU COLLECTIVE
RUEKJCS/JOINT STAFF WASHINGTON DC
RUEKJCS/SECDEF WASHINGTON DC
RUCNDT/USMISSION USUN NEW YORK 3625
RUEAIIA/CIA WASHINGTON DC
RHEFDIA/DIA WASHINGTON DC
RUEKJCS/OSD WASHINGTON DC
RHEHAAA/NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL WASHINGTON DC
RHMFIUU/HQ USCENTCOM MACDILL AFB FL

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 KABUL 000395 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPT FOR SCA/FO, SCA/A, S/CR, S/CT, SCA/PAB, EUR/RPM 
STATE PASS TO USAID FOR AID/ANE 
NSC FOR AHARRIMAN 
OSD FOR KIMMITT 
CENTCOM FOR CG CFC-A, CG CJTF-76, AND POLAD 
RELEASABLE TO NATO/ISAF/AUS/NZ 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREL PGOV AF
SUBJECT: PRT QALAT: PROGRESS ON WOMEN'S ISSUES--ONE STEP AT 
A TIME 
 
¶1. (U) SUMMARY: By their actions and through a series of 
meetings with the PRT, local women have expressed their 
desire for employment, education, and security in southern 
Zabul province.  Key players for women's activities in Zabul 
are the Directorate of Women's Affairs (DOWA), two women 
Provincial Council members, and the director of the 
provincial capital Qalat girls, school.  The DOWA director 
has been ineffective, and rivalries among all the women 
leaders impede progress in advancing women's causes.  The 
girls' school in the provincial capital is filled with 1,100 
students and is running smoothly.  The PRT is working 
actively to help local women become more engaged in 
activities that will provide them with new skills; however, 
perceived security concerns are an obstacle to engaging them 
in such activities.  END SUMMARY. 
 
------------------------------------------ 
Women Members Active in Provincial Council 
------------------------------------------ 
¶2. (U) The Zabul Provincial Council (PC) includes two women. 
The third woman-designated slot on the council is currently 
vacant because no other women submitted their names for 
election.  The two women council members are active in PC 
activities.  They recently expressed their interest in 
attending the weekly Provincial Development Council meetings 
but noted that they felt that they would not be welcomed 
there by other (male) provincial leaders.  Zabul's UNAMA 
representative has encouraged them to attend these meetings 
and has engaged with the Governor to try and ensure they are 
included. 
 
--------------------------------------------- 
Qalat Girls, School Filled with 1100 Students 
--------------------------------------------- 
¶3. (U) The girls, school in Qalat is open and according to 
the school director, there are currently about 1100 students 
and 27 teachers at the school.  (Note: The PRT built the 
school with the PRT Commander's Emergency Reconstruction 
Program Funds.  The school cost approximately USD 150,000 to 
build.  End Note).  Students range from 7 to 22 years in age 
and are enrolled in grades one through nine.  Not 
surprisingly, given the prohibitions during the Taliban 
years, the largest classes are comprised of the younger 
students; there are 395 students (approximately twenty five 
percent) in the first grade, but only nine students in the 
ninth grade.  The teachers are not all professionals, and the 
majority are not from Zabul province.   The teachers, which 
include three males, stated that they are usually paid on 
time; they receive USD 50 per month.  Classes are taught in a 
variety of subjects, including religion, physics, Dari, math, 
history and English.  During a December visit to the school, 
the PRT observed the higher grades in the middle of their 
exams; the lower grades were already out on winter break, 
with the higher grades soon to follow.  Depending on the 
weather, classes are scheduled to resume mid-February. 
 
--------------------------------------------- -- 
Women Want to Work But Lack Skills, Opportunity 
--------------------------------------------- -- 
¶4. (U) Local women have repeatedly expressed their desire to 
work to PRToff, but most do not have the training or 
experience to do anything more than the most menial tasks. 
Currently, the only viable opportunity for work outside the 
home is at the World Food Program-supported Green Afghanistan 
Initiative (GAIN) center plant nursery, where approximately 
85 to 100 women receive basic agricultural training and then 
cultivate plants, nuts and trees.  Last month, the GAIN 
center implemented a literacy program, where women can take 
classes after work.  The PRT paid a visit to the GAIN center 
and observed approximately forty women in the training room 
learning to read.   After twenty one days of work (and class, 
if desired), they are paid, in kind, with basic foodstuffs 
such as wheat, vegetable oil, salt and nuts.  Apart from this 
group, very few, if any, local women work outside the home. 
 
KABUL 00000395  002 OF 003 
 
 
The women Provincial Council members suggested that women 
would be willing to work at a factory if one existed, but (as 
PRToff pointed out) there would first have to be a viable 
industry that could sustain a factory.  Such a project would 
also require better infrastructure, including transport, as 
well as a training program for the labor force.  In short, it 
should be seen as a long term objective. 
 
------------------------------------------ 
PRT-Sponsored Training Programs Help Women 
------------------------------------------ 
¶5. (U) The PRT is keenly aware of the influence that women in 
the province hold, especially within their families. 
Therefore, it shows its support by providing women of all 
ages with basic tools that serve as a first step towards 
making positive changes for them and their families.  Working 
with the Director of Education and Gulnar, the PRT will soon 
begin a program to teach basic first aid, hygiene and family 
care to women at the hospital.  Additionally, a local woman 
teaches rug weaving and embroidery to young women in her 
home.  This class was originally part of the PRT-run trade 
school, but due to security concerns it is now taught as an 
extension class.  At the request of the women leaders, the 
PRT built a suggestion box and delivered it to the girls, 
school, where women in Qalat can anonymously deliver 
suggestions and complaints to women leaders.  In a recent 
meeting, the women complained that they do not have the 
opportunity to travel to other districts to see and talk to 
women outside the provincial capital.  Two days later, the 
PRT invited women PC members to travel to Mizan district via 
helicopter as the PRT accompanied Governor Arman to the 
district center to hold a meeting with local leaders, with 
the hope that they would arrange a woman's meeting as well. 
The women initially said they would travel to Mizan, but they 
canceled the day before the trip without explanation. 
 
--------------------------------------------- - 
Women's Resource Center Is Focus for the Future 
--------------------------------------------- - 
¶6. (U) The PRT is working on a plan to make the Women's 
Resource Center not only functional, but, indeed, the center 
of women's activities in Qalat.  The PRT will equip the 
Center with computers and plans to provide computer training. 
 It also intends to move the courses currently being taught 
at the girls, school and the rug weaving and embroidery 
being taught in a private home to the center.  The hope is 
for the Women's Resource Center to become regarded as a place 
where all women can feel safe as they acquire the skills that 
will allow them to work within their communities and aid 
their families. 
 
------------------------------------------ 
Director of Women's Affairs Is Ineffective 
------------------------------------------ 
¶7. (U) The focal point of women's activities in Zabul 
province should be the Directorate of Women's Affairs (DOWA), 
headed by Dr. Gulnar.  Until recently, Dr. Gulnar had been an 
ineffective director at best, and an active obstructionist at 
worst.  She has spent a great deal of time away from Zabul, 
usually in Kabul.  While away, she is impossible to contact. 
She claims to have a representative that can act in her stead 
while she is gone, but in practice that does not happen and 
little gets done during her absences.  There recently has 
been improvement, with Gulnar engaging with PRTOff on a 
variety of issues, including the start of a women's health 
education course. 
 
¶8. (U) USAID recently funded the construction of a Women's 
Resource Center in the provincial capital Qalat, which was 
completed in September 2006.  Gulnar and her staff have yet 
to move into the building and, until recently, despite 
constant encouragement, took very little interest in making 
it a functioning and sustainable center for women in the 
province.  Gulnar has recently agreed to hold an opening of 
 
KABUL 00000395  003 OF 003 
 
 
the building in February and then hold the celebration for 
International Woman's Day on March eighth in the center.  She 
has also agreed that the computers the PRT is purchasing 
should go into the center and that computer and other courses 
should take place in the center. 
 
--------------------------------------------- 
Fighting Among Women Leaders Hinders Progress 
--------------------------------------------- 
¶9. (U) Ironically, an obstacle to progress for women is the 
animosity that exists among the key women leaders in the 
province.  The PC women members believe that Gulnar is 
ineffective, and allege that she is not using her budget 
properly.  They assert that she is giving donated items 
intended for women to men in Zabul instead.  They said that 
they were lobbying the governor to pressure Gulnar to step 
down as Director of Women's Affairs and go back to being a 
medical doctor.  The women PC members have a personal grudge 
against the director of the girls, school, apparently 
stemming from a family dispute.  The first time the PRT 
visited the girls, school, accompanied by the women PC 
members, the school director attempted to bar the PC members 
from entering.  They were eventually allowed in, but the 
tension in the room was palpable.  There is a marked 
difference in the dynamics of meetings depending on which 
women are present. 
 
--------------------------------------------- ------ 
Perceptions of Inadequate Security Impedes Progress 
--------------------------------------------- ------ 
¶10. (U) The women's perception of a lack of security is an 
obstacle to making progress on women's issues in Zabul 
province.  For the past six months, women have refused to 
attend classes held at the PRT compound or even to meet with 
PRT officers there due to personal safety concerns.  In a 
November meeting, DOWA director Gulnar and the two women PC 
members asked the PRT to supply them with personal weapons. 
Having a weapon, they said, would increase their comfort 
level as they walk around the city.  The three women recently 
reiterated this request, explaining that the Taliban have 
come to houses in Qalat at night and told husbands not to let 
their wives go out. (Note: These women did not say the 
Taliban have come to their own homes, just that Taliban come 
to houses at night in general.  End Note.)  When asked what 
could be done to improve security for women, they suggested 
that police should be hired from their home village to 
protect their village.  (Note: This is the intent behind the 
auxiliary police program currently being implemented in Zabul 
and encouraged by the PRT.  End note.) 
 
------- 
COMMENT 
------- 
¶11.  (SBU)  Zabul province provides a snapshot of the 
challenges facing women, women's leaders and advocates, and 
programs for women across Afghanistan.  There is progress, 
but it is slow.  Pushing for more than the system can bear at 
a particular moment is counterproductive, but the PRTs and 
the Embassy look for opportunities to push the agenda in 
every province and with the central government.  END COMMENT. 
NEUMANN