W omen hold up half the sky, but in the room at the Afghanistan Embassy in New Delhi last week, there wasn’t space for even one.

The team of the visiting Taliban Foreign Minister, Amir Khan Muttaqi, which used the premises to hold a press conference, did not think it necessary to invite a single woman. The Ministry of External Affairs did not think it was necessary either. Earlier that day, Mr. Muttaqi was hosted at the grand official venue, Hyderabad House, without a woman, official or otherwise, in sight. Whether this was mandated by the Taliban leader, a former Minister of Education for a regime that doesn’t allow girls in school beyond Class 6; or a genuine oversight; or a “technical error”, as he termed it, it wasn’t allowed to pass.

Reportage of the ‘men only’ press meet, followed

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