NEWS FLASH

Afghanistan Opens First All-Women Internet Cafe | To call the state of women’s rights in Afghanistan deplorable would be a gross understatement. Systematic discrimination and repression remain forces in the society despite codification of some equal rights following the fall of the Taliban. Today, though, a small step was taken to give at least some women access to the internet in the capital, Kabul, where an all-women internet cafe opened. “We wanted women to not be afraid, to create a safe place for women to use the internet,” a 25-year-old activist who helped open the cafe told Reuters. For about $1 an hour, women can work there. But some women’s rights activists objected to separating the sexes: “If we do things separately then we will have to continue this in future,” said one.