US Blocks Visit from Malalai Joya

On March 11th, just nine days after International Women’s Day, Afghan human rights activist Malalai Joya was denied entry to the United States. Joya, a TIME magazine ‘100 most influential people in the world’ recipient in 2010, was due to begin a three-week book tour to promote an updated version of her memoir ‘A Woman Among Warlords’ on the 20th of March. At the age of 27, Joya was the youngest woman elected to Afghanistan’s parliament in 2005, and has since been the target of at least five assassination attempts. 

Sonali Kolhatkar of the Afghan Women’s Mission (AWM) expressed shock at the visa denial, saying, “Malalai has never before been denied a visa to the US. What are the immigration authorities afraid of? I can only speculate that they are afraid of the effect of her words at a time when the US war in Afghanistan is more unpopular than ever.” Kolhatkar continued, “The reason Joya lives underground is because she faces the constant threat of death for having had the courage to speak up for women’s rights – it’s obscene that the U.S. government would deny her entry.” 

The visa denial has exposed the hypocrisy of the US’s stated desire to liberate Afghan women. Kolhatkar, co-author of the book ‘Bleeding Afghanistan’, noted, “What does liberation mean when in reality the government is busy silencing Joya? I hope they do the right thing and allow her into the country for the mere three weeks she was scheduled to be here. Audiences in 13 different US states have worked so hard to organise a national tour so that she can shed light on what’s really happening in Afghanistan.”

Malalai Joya, a 32-year-old Afghan activist, has twice visited London: in 2008 to receive the RAW in WAR annual Anna Politkovskaya Award and in 2009 to promote her book, published in the UK by Ebury Press. During her visit, she met MP Jeremy Corbin and Baroness Warsi, who commended her efforts to fight for justice on behalf of her people, particularly oppressed women and girls. Her calls for NATO troops to withdraw from Afghanistan have made her a controversial figure outside of her country, but she has many supporters internally. 

In 2007, Joya was suspended from parliament after she criticised it for failing to accomplish enough for the Afghan people. She declined to stand for re-election in the recent electoral process and instead chose to channel her energies into activism. 

Her book, ‘A Woman Among Warlords’, has been translated into over a dozen languages and has been widely acclaimed. Joya has toured widely to promote it and her cause, visiting Australia, the UK, Canada, Norway, Germany, Italy, Spain, Portugal, France, and the Netherlands. 

However, when Joya applied for a visa to tour the US, she was denied because she was deemed to be “unemployed” and “living underground”. This decision has been met with criticism from the American Civil Liberties Union, who argue that it violates Americans’ First Amendment right to hear constitutionally protected speech. 

Events featuring Malalai Joya are planned across the US, from March 20 until April 10, in New York, New Jersey, Washington DC, Maryland, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Minnesota, Oregon, Washington and California. Organizers of her speaking tour are encouraging people to contact the Department of State to ask them to grant Joya’s visa and fulfill the Obama Administration’s promise of “promoting the global marketplace of ideas”.

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