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On December 30, 2009, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations published a request for help on its website. In the message, United Nations staff said they urgently needed to collect food for widows in Tajikistan.
In the message area of this news, enthusiastic netizens from all over the world expressed their blessings for this vulnerable group. Some people have also generously donated to this good cause.
In the end, the FAO project had a much better effect than expected. This exciting news has even attracted the attention of many media such as the Associated Press and Reuters.
(Logo of "Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations")
At the time, the camera was focused on the head of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, but few people really paid attention to the "vulnerable group" most in need of help in the project: widows from Tajikistan.
You know, Tajikistan's "strategic point" in Central Asia has been a necessary place for all kinds of merchant brigades and armies since ancient times. It is for this reason that the population here has always been very prosperous.
(Women of Tajikistan)
But why do so many widows appear in Tajikistan today? How does this large "group of widows" relate to the history of Tajikistan? Where will the fate of these widows lead in the future?
(Scenery of Tajikistan)
I. The world-famous "special group"
Tajikistan's widows, though unknown on the Chinese Internet, are as well-known in Central Asia as the country's leaders.
Even today, in the eyes of many Central Asians, Tajikistan is already "deeply bound" to the word widow.
Associated Press reporters have visited "widows' groups" in Tajikistan in depth. Most of them gather on the outskirts of the city and live in very poor conditions.
(Women of Tajikistan)
A Tajik woman named Ordova lost her husband in 2004. As a result, she had to struggle to survive with her two children.
When the reporter came to the village to interview, the Aldova family's cow happened to be sick. Because the cows got sick, Ordova's family lost their source of income for days on end.
He had to search for a veterinarian and then go into the city to find some subsistence work.
(Scenery of Tajikistan)
Ordova told reporters that there are many widows like him who make a living by milking cows like him. Their husbands have not been heard from so far, so they have to gather together in order to survive, so that they can take care of each other.
In fact, the "widow's problem" has long become a major social problem in Tajikistan. In a country of just over 9 million people, the number of widows even exceeded 800,000 at one point, accounting for nearly one-tenth of the local population.
Faced with such a large "group of widows" and their survival, the government officials of Tajikistan are also clearly a group of "masters of pretending to be confused".
Whenever a reporter asks a question about the "widow's community," the Ministry of Internal Affairs bureaucrats in Kykstan talk about him in a flash.
("Street View" in Tajikistan)
After repeated questioning by reporters, they left a promise of "it will be solved" and left the scene hastily. In fact, this is not the first time they have made such a response.
It turns out that if they have the energy and ability to solve these problems. Those widows would not have lived as destitute as they do today.
It may seem that the "widows' community" does not seem to have any difficulties. After all, most countries now have achieved the freedom to marry, and they can find another man to start a new family.
("Women" from Tajikistan)
However, Central Asia, where Tajikistan is located, has always been known for its conservatism and feudalism. More than 98 percent of its residents are Muslim, and their children are born Muslims.
Many women did not marry their current husbands voluntarily either. A considerable number of them were even "robbed" by their current husbands.
The so-called "robbery" refers to a marriage custom that is quite popular in Central Asia. In the ancient steppe tribes of the continent, there were also such customs. In various texts on the mainland, this custom is often referred to as "marriage robbery".
("Street View" in Tajikistan)
To put it simply, a strong man sees a girl or even a bride in a certain family, and they go straight away and snatch the woman to be his wife.
The robbed family either found enough "strong men" to compete with the marriage robbers. Or you can only consider yourself unlucky. It is hard to imagine that even today, such backward customs are widespread in the rural and suburban areas of Tajikistan.
This practice of marriage robbery dates back to Central Asia in the 8th century AD. At that time, most of the Central Asia was populated by nomads. Later, these nomads converted to Islam, which formed today's patriarchal social pattern.
(Tajik woman in "national costume")
In local Shariah, a man can marry a woman if he succeeds in "robbing the marriage". And in the face of this sudden disaster, the woman has no right to refuse at all.
Otherwise, the woman will be scolded and even beaten by everyone. Such feudal customs reached their peak after the annexation of Tajikistan by Tsarist Russia.
Although Tsarist Russia was very happy to expand the lands under its jurisdiction, the Russian Tsar apparently did not have much interest in how to govern local society.
("Women" from Tajikistan)
As long as the local Islamic elders hinted that taxes and tribute would be paid to the tsar. The central government of tsarist Russia would most likely not interfere in local social affairs.
So at that time the nominal rulers of the local area were the tsars, but the actual rulers were still those Islamic elders.
During the Soviet era, in order to liberate women, the central government of the Soviet Union sent troops directly into Tajikistan to suppress the reactionary religious forces.
(Oil painting depicting the "peoples of Central Asia")
Since then, the movement for equal rights for men and women in Tajikistan has finally achieved a "progressive development".
However, with a series of political events such as the drastic changes in Eastern Europe and the collapse of the Soviet Union, the status of women in Tajikistan returned to its previous state.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the various religious forces in Tajikistan lost control. The once barbaric and backward "marriage robbery custom" has returned in a grand manner.
("Feudal officers" in Tsarist Russia)
In rural Tajikistan in 2002, a female university student who did not want to marry the man who snatched her away was stoned to death by the local population.
The thugs then returned the girl's body to her home and placed a strip of cloth in front of it, which read: This is the end of the pursuit of freedom.
Due to the failure of the rebellion, in the eyes of the vast majority of "married" women, they have little second choice but to accept the injustice of fate. Because no matter what, life still has to be lived.
("Street" after the collapse of the USSR)
In addition, in the strong local religious culture, people are prejudiced and discriminated against "women who have died husbands". This directly led to the fact that those widows could not choose to marry.
Even if someone is lucky enough to start a family with someone else, their children and even themselves will be seen by the other party as a burden and trouble for the family. Living in such a family environment, how much better can people's mentality be?
Since a significant proportion of the "widow's group" in Tajikistan is below the international poverty line. Therefore, they are also the object of attention of major international organizations.
(People of Tajikistan)
The Tajik government has not done much to hide this special and large social group. Because the attention of the international community can indeed bring some real attention and even benefits to this small Central Asian country.
In Tajikistan, there has been more than one case of "embezzlement or even resale of international aid". But this is not news in Tajikistan today.
("Mosque" in Tajikistan)
But around the world, countries like Tajikistan that are politically corrupt and conservative are everywhere. Why is it that only Tajikistan has produced a large "group of widows"?
To understand why, we also need to turn our attention back to Central Asia after the collapse of the Soviet Union.
("Mosque" in Tajikistan)
II War: Causing women to lose their families
In 1992, a protracted civil war broke out in Tajikistan. The war affected almost all political forces in Central Asia, and at one point the number of participants exceeded 200,000.
After the independence of Tajikistan, the Communist Party of Tajikistan, led by Rahmon Nabiev, won a victory in the change of political power. This result quickly drew the resentment of Islamist political forces in the country.
At that time, the "Tajikistan Islamic Renaissance Party" joined forces with the "Democratic Party of Tajikistan" and other opposition parties to jointly attack the then leader of the country, Nabiyev.
("Muslim population" in Russia)
At this moment, Nabiyev has sensed a hint of something wrong. While trying to negotiate peacefully with the opposition as much as possible, he also hoped to send troops to bring the situation under complete control.
But the dire political situation in Tajikistan eventually turned into a civil war. The civil war, which was supposed to belong to the Tajiks, ended up involving neighboring Russians and Uzbeks.
Socialism, communism, Islamic fundamentalism... Fierce fighting has been repeated in a country of less than 150,000 square kilometers. Countless civilians at the bottom have been forced to flee their homes and run to neighboring Russia and Uzbekistan.
(Social riots after the collapse of the "Soviet Union")
The war resulted in more than 100,000 deaths, injuries and countless more disabilities. Although in the end through this war, Nabiyev consolidated his power. But the country has been devastated by war.
After the war, countless Tajik women became "widows". Many of them have even been wounded in the war and become disabled, living on a strong will.
Under these circumstances, the Government had hoped to achieve social stability by remarrying these widows to the military. But under the influence of traditional thinking, not many soldiers are willing to marry widows, and those widows are not willing to remarry.
("Muslims" in Central Asia)
In desperation, this matter has been delayed. To this day, the "widows' community" has become a social force to be reckoned with in Tajikistan.
After the end of the civil war in Tajikistan, the Government made great efforts to popularize the idea of "equality between men and women" everywhere. This was done in order to benefit the country in the process of economic development in the future, but the ultimate effect was still not obvious.
Because compared with the idea of "equality between men and women", various feudal ideas have been passed down locally for thousands of years.
(Women in Tajikistan)
In some places, Islamic chiefs have even openly stood up against the government, threatening that anyone who dares to accept the idea of equality between men and women will die.
Under these circumstances, the Tajik government's initiative has once again failed. And the minds of the people are not liberated, and the plight of the widows in Tajikistan cannot be improved at all.
(Tajik woman in "national costume")
In recent years, as Tajikistan's domestic economic situation has continued to improve, the lives of Tajiks seem to have improved a little.
But what people never expected was that economic improvement did not lead to a change in thinking. The growing economic situation has even taken an even more serious toll on married women in Tajikistan.
(Beautiful Tajik girl)
III. Economic Development Families are broken
Because the natural conditions in Tajikistan are too harsh. The local agricultural population was a very small part of the entire society, and in the Tsarist era most people even lived nomadic herding.
In modern times, although Tajikistan developed a weak industrial system with the help of the Soviet central government. But this industrial system was highly dependent on the internal system of the Soviet Union.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, these industrial facilities in Tajikistan instantly became scrap metal. In this case, the Tajiks are all in a very awkward situation:
(Tajikistan's "countryside" landscape)
It is impossible for them to return to rural areas to continue their nomadic pastoralism, nor to get enough breadwinner jobs in the cities to support their families. In desperation, many people have no choice but to flee to neighboring Russia or even further afield China.
The Tajik government, seeing such a deformed social situation, had to start thinking about developing the economy. They simply concluded agreements on the export of labor services with China, Russia and other countries.
In these agreements, Tajiks would have access to neighboring countries to earn their own livelihoods, and in exchange, Tajikistan would open its internal markets to those countries to promote trade between the two sides.
("Tajik women" on the street)
After these agreements were signed, many Tajiks cheered. Some even took to the streets to celebrate this hard-won "policy shift" through demonstrations.
As more and more men leave their families to work in neighbouring countries, women in Tajikistan naturally take on the burden of the family.
Although it stands to reason that the men earn money by working outside the home, they have to send a portion of their income home to support their wives and children.
But many family members of young migrant workers told The Associated Press that they had never received money from their husbands from abroad. And many people receive their "divorce text messages" shortly after their husbands go to work abroad.
Since the husbands of these women were in a foreign country, even the Government of Tajikistan could not contact them for a while, and the women, who were powerless to change, were able to silently accept the fact that they had lost their husbands and became widows.
(Tajik woman in "national costume")
There were also brave Tajik women who came forward and turned to the international media for help. As a result, they have become regular visitors to many European and American news media, much to the annoyance of Tajik government officials.
The government can only prohibit this kind of "escaping the country through work" as much as possible through legislation. In 2004, the Tajik Parliament passed a bill stipulating that men who went abroad to work were not allowed to divorce their wives in the country.
But this law is simply ineffective for Tajik men who want to abscond from the country. Since they are all planning to flee the country, how can they care about the laws of their own countries?
(Young men and women of Tajikistan dressed in "national costumes")
For many years, people have been deeply disillusioned with the administrative efficiency of the Tajik government. Counting on the incompetent Tajik police to help the population solve their problems is tantamount to daydreaming.
And even if the Tajik government were able to enforce the law strictly, it would be beyond the reach of men who had fled abroad.
Therefore, this law enacted by Tajikistan, in addition to dealing with international public opinion that is unfavorable to itself, will not help those women living in dire straits!
("Nature" in Tajikistan)
Tajikistan today still faces economic poverty. Over the years, the "export of foreign labor" has only lifted several major cities out of poverty. Many more are still struggling below the international poverty line.
The plight of women in Tajikistan is a microcosm of the population of countless developing countries. In a series of trade rules formulated by the old imperialist countries, those third world countries that do not have the ability to develop independently can only be exploited to the point that "they can never live beyond life."
The corrupt political system, chaotic social environment, and conservative cultural ideology have become the main reasons for their tragic lives while imprisoning them.
(The "wedding" of the people of Tajikistan)
In fact, if the people of a country want to live a truly happy and peaceful life, they must achieve national rise and social liberation in a real sense. But throughout human history, very few countries have actually achieved these two things.
We do not live in a peaceful world. Our happy life today is achieved through the selfless sacrifice and unremitting struggle of our ancestors.
But this is only the first step in a hundred-mile journey. The road to a nation's rejuvenation is bound to be very long. And we also have reason to believe that after summing up countless historical experiences, we will definitely embark on a good road of our own.
Bibliography:
《Scrap Metal For Food Scraps: A Tajik Widow's Struggle To Survive》 RFE
《Tajik IS Widows Say They're Paying For Their Husbands' Actions, But Courts Aren't Convinced 》RFE
《Tajik Widow Gunned Down at Grave》AP News
《Ashurakhon Obidova, Tajikistan "I am a poor widow, having lost my husband in the Tajik civil war"》The New Humanitarian
《UN food distribution brings New Year cheer to Tajik widow》 UN News
Editor: Sugar Gourd
Responsible editor: Hyacinth