Accountability in Afghanistan: The UN Human Rights Council’s crucial crossroads
In 2025, the United Nations Human Rights Council (HRC) is at a critical crossroad in terms of its role in aiding in the current dismal human rights situation in Afghanistan. With the advent of a Taliban government in August 2021, there has been even more stark rights violations and in particular to women, girls, minorities and those who oppose the Taliban, necessitating the increase of accountability mechanisms by state and civil society. Such geopolitical realities as well as limited funding and political pressure within the HRC itself highlight the importance and vulnerability of multilateral human rights governance in current conflict contexts in its attempts to build serious investigatory and monitoring powers.
The impetus for enhanced accountability mechanisms
The human rights crisis in Afghanistan has grown with the onset of Taliban rule and further led to the calls on the greater international response on accountability efforts. Multilateral organizations continue to come under pressure to move beyond symbolic actions and to make possible effective and independent investigations.
Growing calls for an independent investigative mandate
Since the Taliban’s takeover, multiple cross-regional coalitions of states have pressed the HRC to create an independent investigative mechanism with a broad, comprehensive mandate to pursue accountability for serious human rights violations and abuses. Led by such nations as Iceland, Chile and South Africa this initiative will supplement the current Special Rapporteur role in Afghanistan with its cell-choked character of repression and endemic abuses. These states indicate the need to ensure that there is a specialized mechanism to investigate, gather, preserve and examine evidence to have better channels of international justice through the intervention of the International Criminal Court (ICC) and other legal methods.
In his February 2025 report, the UN Special Rapporteur on Afghanistan, Richard Bennett, pointed out that impunity continues to fuel the oppressive policies of the Taliban, particularly against the female population, including and especially the girls. A failure to prosecute these perpetrators indicates a chilling atmosphere where something as basic as education of girls beyond sixth grade gets banned and employers severely limit the rights of women’s occupation and representation in the society. As it stands, there is an obvious lack of adequate mechanisms to curb the abuses or provide any substantive remedies.
Civil society and humanitarian organizations call for action
International and Afghan civil society groups have continuously campaigned on the need to increase international accountability. They emphasize that recording and maintaining evidence is very important not only to justice but also to the history and identity of the victims. These operations assist in exploring gender-based persecutions, extrajudicial killings, torture and other serious crimes that occur under Taliban governance.
In the meantime, humanitarian crises are worsening. Over 1.9 million Afghans were forcibly returned or even left the neighboring countries in 2025 alone, with Iran deporting over 410,000 of them, at which point they many times lack security and face impeded access to assistance on returning. The skilled experts at UN have criticized such mass forced returns as they are exposing people to the risk of persecution and even going against the international protection principles, such as non-refoulement.
Political dynamics within the Human Rights Council
There is universal agreement about the worsening situation in Afghanistan but there is sharp political schism in the HRC on how to respond. These tend to be influenced by the larger geopolitics, and fears of national sovereignty.
Divergent geopolitical positions hinder cohesive responses
While the European Union (EU) has led efforts to strengthen the Special Rapporteur’s mandate and promote accountability, frustrations mount over its reluctance to back the creation of a more forceful and independent investigative body. Such reluctance indicates wider political cracks in the HRC. Russia, India, China, and Iran among other countries have reservations on UN resolutions on Afghanistan. Russia denounces sanctions and asset holds; India along with Afghanistan make decisions on Afghan led solutions; China urges removal of unilateral sanctions and Iran proclaims sovereignty in its problem that should not be imposed by outside powers.
This geopolitical division makes it hard to build an agreement in the Council and diminishes the extent and effect of resolutions. Some 50 countries are advocates of greater accountability but abstentions and voting against common efforts are continuously reducing concerted efforts. This kind of schism threatens to weaken the credibility of the Council at a time when concerted multilateral pressure has been required.
Challenges posed by funding and operational capacity
The HRC is situated in an environment of financial limitation and competing agenda. Persistent insufficient funding prevents sufficient amounts of resources to be allocated to observation tasks, report writing, and aiding civil society activity. Although the office of the Special Rapporteur has been strengthened in skill with the introduction of more experts in areas of forensics, legal examinations, and defenses of rights, this department continues to face shortages of funds to counter increasing demands.
This has led to delays or the under capacity operation of the investigations that are critical in the abuse in Afghanistan. The threat of the loss of evidence and a chance to intervene in time increases. Additionally, interferences in political processes that can be utilized by decreasing financing and donor exhaustion put independence and sustainability of the accountability concepts at risk.
The broader human rights and legal implications
The international accountability mechanisms used on Afghanistan have other implications on other countries. Their success will indicate the increased ability of international organisations to protect fundamental human rights principles in autocratic societies.
Gender-based persecution as a crime against humanity
In July 2025, the International Criminal Court (ICC) made a historic move in issuing an arrest warrant against the Taliban leader Haibatullah Akhundzada and the Chief Justice Abdul Hakim Haqqani as the Court charged them with the crime against humanity of gender persecution. This move highlights the seriousness of the systematic oppressions against women and girls in Afghanistan such as prohibition of education, employment, and participation in the society in addition to bloody repression of disagreement.
This legal achievement marks an essential affirmation of the size and level of violations, as well as the shortcomings of executing such international laws in situations where the Taliban continues an uncompliant government power in terms of enforcing justice.
Humanitarian and displacement crises compound accountability challenges
The humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan, which has led to the displacement of millions of citizens both internally and externally, food insecurity, and shortages in health services meets up with the issues of human rights. Forced returns from Pakistan and Iran have placed further strain on already vulnerable populations. Women-headed households, minorities, and victims of gender-based violence face heightened risks, compounded by Taliban restrictions on female humanitarian workers.
These conditions amplify the need for coordinated international action not only to document violations but to protect, assist, and empower affected communities. However, diminishing donor support and political disagreements obstruct coherent responses, leaving many at risk and under-served.
Voices calling for renewed global commitment
The mandate of the Human Rights Council in Afghanistan has been strained but still international actors demand to act with principles and coordination. Based on moral and legal and strategic imperatives, these appeals are informed.
Analysts and players in the human rights arena underline the fact that HRC has reached a decisive turning point with respect to the Afghanistan mandate. The petitions on an accountability mechanism that is independent can be seen as an effort to address the missing gaps in current mandates and a warning that the international society is no longer going to tolerate impunity with regard to gross abuses.
This stand echoes the vocalization by the world stakeholders who emphasize the importance of protecting vulnerable people and to safeguard the norms of human rights in light of worsening circumstances. Effective diplomacy, more financial resources, and a politicized yet principled approach to international justice cannot be avoided in case the Council wants to keep its promises.
This individual has addressed the issue on a public platform stressing that monitoring of human rights and accountability measures must be improved in Afghanistan in order to arrest the current breaches and to foster justice.
The road forward of the UN human rights council in the context of Afghanistan is one of obstacles in terms of geopolitical division as well as operation limitations. The decision is either to reinforce the international processes with a determination or risk the possibility of deviating the primeval ideals of Human Rights in one of the most vulnerable sectors of the world. The way this balance is conventionally imposed will have implications for the largest state, determining the credibility and efficacy of multilateral human rights oversight roles in the 21st-century crisis environment, which is characterized by multi-dimensional measures.
