![Asian Games in Afghanistan](https://sports.inquirer.net/files/2023/09/AP23265534834693-620x413.jpg)
FILE – A volunteer holds up the country’s sign for the Afghan men’s team during a welcome ceremony at the 19th Asian Games in Hangzhou, China, Wednesday, Sept. 20, 2023. (AP Photo/Louise Delmotte, File)
HANGZHOU, China — In the first Asian Games since the Taliban regained control of Afghanistan, two teams of athletes arrive in the Chinese city of Hangzhou looking very different.
One of these, sent from Afghanistan, where women are now banned from participating in sports by the Taliban, consists of around 130 all-male athletes, who will take part in 17 different sports, including volleyball, judo and wrestling, Atel Mashwani, a by the Taliban-appointed spokesman for the Afghan Olympic Committee, told The Associated Press.
Another, competing under the black, red and green flag of the elected government the Taliban overthrew in 2021, comes from the diaspora of Afghan athletes around the world and includes 17 women, according to Hafizullah Wali Rahimi, the president of the Afghan National Olympic Games. Committee from before the Taliban took power.
Rahimi, who now works from outside Afghanistan but is still recognized by many countries as an official representative on Olympic affairs, told reporters late Thursday at the team’s official arrival ceremony that the athletes are there for the love of sport.
“We want to keep sports completely out of politics so that athletes can freely pursue their sporting activities and development within and outside their countries,” he said.
Rahimi’s contingent at the welcoming ceremony was made up entirely of men, but he said the women were on the way, consisting of a volleyball team that has been training in Iran, cyclists from Italy and an athletics representative from Australia.
He did not respond to an email request Friday asking for more details.
Although the Taliban promised a more moderate rule than during their previous spell in power in the 1990s, they have imposed harsh measures since capturing Afghanistan in August 2021, as US and NATO troops withdrew after two decades of war.
They have excluded women from most areas of public life, such as parks, gyms and work, and have cracked down on media freedom. They have banned girls from going to school after sixth grade, and banned Afghan women from working in local and non-governmental organizations. The ban was extended to United Nations employees in April.
The measures have sparked intense international uproar, deepening the country’s isolation at a time when the economy has collapsed and the humanitarian crisis has worsened.
Rahimi said that since the previous Taliban regime, the previous government had worked hard to increase women’s participation in sports, and it had risen to 20%.
“We certainly hope it comes back,” he said. “Not just sports, we hope they get access to schools and education again, because those are the basic rights of a human being.”