Taliban authorities have destroyed dozens of musical instruments, just days after closing beauty salons across Afghanistan. The nation’s vice ministry department said it deemed music immoral, destroying hundreds of dollars worth of musical gear in a bonfire over the weekend.
Images shared showed a guitar, two other stringed instruments, a harmonium and a tabla, as well as amplifiers and speakers being burnt.
“Promoting music causes moral corruption and playing it will cause the youth to go astray,” Aziz al-Rahman al-Muhajir, the head of the Herat Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, said. Most of the items were collected from wedding halls in the Herat province. Taliban authorities have steadily imposed laws and regulations reflecting an austere vision of Islam — including banning playing music in public — since they seized power in August 2021.
Thousands of beauty salons were shut across the country after Taliban authorities deemed certain makeovers to be too costly, or un-Islamic, last week.
Women have borne the brunt of the new government regulations, and are not allowed in public unless wearing a hijab. Teenage girls and women have been barred from schools and universities, and they are also prohibited from entering parks, playgrounds and gyms.
A handout photo made available by Afghanistan’s Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice shows members of Taliban setting fire to a pile of musical instruments and equipment on the outskirts of Herat, Afghanistan, 30 July 2023 (issued 31 July 2023). EPA-EFE/Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice
