KABUL, 23 January 2004 — A warlord who controls much of western Afghanistan has called for an end to television broadcasts of women singing, just a week after a decade-long ban was lifted.

Anti-Soviet hero and anti-Taleban warlord Ismail Khan, who rules the wealthy province of Herat, has banned the broadcast and sale of all audio- and videotapes featuring women singers, his spokesman Ghulam Mohammad Masom said yesterday.

“Afghanistan is an Islamic country and according to the Islamic Shariah women’s singing is forbidden,” Masom told AFP by telephone.

“Not only has the emir (leader Ismail Khan) but all Ulema (religious scholars) have opposed such moves, which is against Islamic laws,” he said.

Masom said showing female singers would fuel support for the ousted fanatical Taleban regime.

On Jan. 12, Kabul TV broadcast old footage of famous 1970s and 80s singer Salma as well as other women singers, prompting a debate between the moderate Ministry of Information and Culture and the deeply religious Supreme Court.

Minister of Information and Culture Sayed Makhdoom Raheen has said however that he would continue to allow such broadcasts on state-run television.

Human rights organizations have voiced concerns that women may again be banished from the small screen.

“The constitution gives men and women equal rights,” said Afghan Independent Human Rights Commissioner Ahmad Nader Nadery, in reference to the country’s newly approved constitution. “Anyone trying to explain the law using their own determination will be condemned,” he said.

“Restricting female activities in any field is against what the constitution says.”

The ban on women singing and dancing had been imposed for more than a decade, following the anti-Soviet Mujahedeen’s takeover of power after the toppling of a Communist government in 1992.

The extremist Taleban regime, which took power in 1996, banned all television broadcasts.

About 500 women protested in the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif on Wednesday in a show of support for elections due in June. The women demonstrated outside a school before marching to an electoral registration center, UN spokesman Manoel de Almeida e Silva said.