Afghan supreme leader calls for implementing Islamic laws

Kabul [Afghanistan], July 1 (ANI): The supreme leader of the Taliban-run administration in Afghanistan, has emphasized the need to implement Islamic laws to ensure justice and safeguard freedom in the country.
Addressing a gathering of religious leaders and elders of his country on Friday, Mullah Hibatullah Akhundzada stated that Afghans had expelled the "occupying forces" from their country to establish an Islamic system. "...we have Islamic system and this is the responsibility of religious scholars to implement Islamic laws," he was quoted as saying Xinhua.
About 3,500 ulema or religious scholars and elders, according to the state-run Bakhtar news agency, have been invited from across the war-torn country to attend the three-day jirga or grand assembly opened on Thursday.
Hibatullah attended the grand assembly Friday morning and called upon businessmen to invest in the war-torn country.
In his speech aired by local media, Hibatullah called for ensuring justice in society, saying, "No government could survive in the absence of justice and justice is the tool of a government to last."
The administration's supreme leader also called for co-existence and said, "We have no ill intentions towards anyone, the neighbouring countries do not feel any harm from us."
The three-day gathering will conclude on Saturday. Eleven months after the re-establishment of the Taliban in the country, this is the first nationwide gathering of Islamic clerics in the country, TOLOnews reported.
The media has not been permitted to cover the incident, but according to sources, several topics including the education of girls will be discussed during the assembly.
Earlier, several clerics and civil rights activists said that the gathering of Islamic scholars should be inclusive.
Many politicians and residents had asked the Taliban to invite women as well as representatives from all Afghan ethnic groups for the gathering of Islamic scholars held today.
The participants at a gathering on Tuesday called women's inclusion in the Loya Jirga "important" and said that the gathering will be meaningless if women were not included.
However, on Wednesday, Taliban-appointed deputy Prime Minister Mawlawi Abdul Salam Hanafi announced that the meeting will convene without the participation of women.
On being asked whether women could become a part of the assembly, deputy minister Hanafi responded that male delegates would speak on their behalf.
According to Khaama Press, the senior Taliban official stated that the assembly was called at the Ulema's request and the Taliban organized it so that they could talk over a variety of topics, like Islamic regime, national unity, and the improvement of economic and social affairs.
However, civil societies have strongly condemned the decision and have called the gathering illegitimate in absence of women.
Taliban has suspended the secondary education of girls and enforced a strict form of Hijab.
They also provide no opportunities for Afghan women to participate in political and public life, to fit the pattern of absolute gender segregation that is aimed at making women invisible in society. (ANI)