HRW: Taliban officials in Afghanistan’s provinces are using a manual that imposes rules harsher than the abusive policies announced by their leaders in Kabul. And Taliban authorities often do not comply with the rights protections that the manual, from the Taliban’s Ministry of Vice and Virtue, sets out.
In the manual, the Taliban discourages people from “helping, befriending…infidels” and instructs religious leaders to advise men on growing their beards. Those who fail to pray or fast as required by religious obligations are to be reported. It prohibits parties and listening to music audible outside a home, cinemas, gambling, and “inappropriate use of tape cassettes, dish antenna, computer and mobile.”