The first Afghan woman to compete in international competitions after the Taliban took over, went for Olympic gold in Paris
Paris: Zakia Khodadadi has spent most of his life breaking glass ceilings. Or rather, smashed them with an assistant.
The Paralympic taekwondo athlete made history in Tokyo in 2021, becoming the first Afghan woman to compete in an international sporting event since the Taliban took back control of her country and US and NATO forces withdrew after 20 years of war.
Initially barred from competing following the rise of the Taliban, he was later evacuated from Afghanistan and allowed to compete for his country after a plea from the international community.
At the 2024 Paralympics, which are part of the wider Olympic Games in Paris, Khodadadi said she is competing in the name of her country's women, who have been gradually disenfranchised over the past three years.
“It's hard for me because I like to compete with my country's flag,” he said. But “life is forbidden for all girls and women in Afghanistan. Done. I am here today to win a medal for them in Paris. I want to show strength to all women and girls in Afghanistan.”
Khodadadi competes for the refugee Paralympic team, while other athletes, such as Olympic runner Kimia Yousefi, seek medals under the Afghan flag. Yousefi's parents fled during the previous Taliban regime, and he was born and raised in neighboring Iran. She said she wants to represent her country, flaws and all, and wants to “be the voice of Afghan girls.”
To Goddadi's credit, she began practicing taekwondo at the age of 11, training in secret at a gym in her hometown of Herat, because there were simply no other opportunities for women to exercise safely. Despite the closed culture around her, Khodadadi said her family is open and encourages her to be active.
She said her disability was what exacerbated her struggles to compete in Afghanistan.
Despite having “one of the largest per capita populations of people with disabilities in the world” due to the conflict, people with disabilities are often shunned and ostracized from Afghan society, according to Human Rights Watch. Women are often disproportionately affected.
Born without a forearm, Khodadadi said he spent his life hiding his arm. It was only when he started competing that things started to change.
“Before I started working out, I used to protect myself a lot with my arm. But little by little… I started to show my arm, but only in the gym. Just during the competition,” he said.
As she began competing, she said she felt the stigma began to fade. Taekwondo once again became his path to freedom, and in 2016 he gained attention when he won his first medal at the international level.
That all changed five years later, when the Taliban came to power after the Biden administration left Afghanistan. While preparing for Tokyo, Khodadadi was caught in Kabul, the capital of this country.
The International Paralympic Committee initially announced by issuing a statement that the Afghan team will not participate in the 2021 Games “due to the current serious situation in the country”. But Khodadadi, trying to compete, released a video and asked for help from the international community.
“Please, I am asking all of you, women around the world, women's advocacy organizations, all government agencies, not to allow the rights of an Afghan female citizen in the Paralympic movement to be taken away so easily,” she said. I do not want my struggle to be in vain.
In 2021, he moved to Tokyo to compete in the tournament, leaving his family behind.
With this, she became the first female Afghan Paralympian in nearly two decades. He won gold in the 2023 European Para Championships.
After fleeing Afghanistan, he settled in Paris, but says he is consumed by the mix of cultures that characterizes his country and the openness of the people who wander the busy streets of Kabul.
“I hope one day I can return to Afghanistan and Kabul to live together in freedom and peace,” he said.
Thousands of miles away in Khodadadi's hometown of Herat, Shah Mohammad, 38, was among his supporters in Paris for Khodadadi and other Afghan female athletes.
Mohammad said: “We are happy for the Afghan women who went to the Olympics, but my wish is that one day women from inside Afghanistan will participate in these games and be the voice of the women of the country.”
That day is unlikely anytime soon.
The Taliban have barred women from much of public life and banned girls from studying beyond the sixth grade as part of a crackdown they have imposed since 2021, despite early promises of a more moderate government. In January, the United Nations announced that the Taliban now restricted Afghan women's access to work, travel and health care if they were single or did not have a male guardian.
Not only have they banned women and girls from playing sports, but they have intimidated and harassed those who once played.
But even before the Taliban returned to power, women's sports faced many objections in the country's deeply conservative society, which was seen as a violation of women's modesty and their role in society.
However, the previous Western-backed government had plans to encourage women's sports and school clubs, leagues and national teams.
For Khodadadi, the IOC refugee team helped him and other athletes who fled their countries to continue their work. The Paralympic athlete is training long hours – with eyes set on a gold medal in Paris – with deep frustration as she watches women's strides erode in her country and Afghanistan once again slips out of the global spotlight.
A question boils in Khodadadi's mind: “Why has the world forgotten Afghan women?”
However, for people like 43-year-old Mohammad Amin Sharifi, watching Khodadadi and other Afghan Olympians in Paris, especially the women, has been a source of pride for people like him in Afghanistan.
“Right now, we need Afghan women's voices to be raised in any way possible, and the Olympics is the best place for that,” said Sharifi from Kabul. We are happy and proud of the women who represent the people of Afghanistan.”
