Celebrating 1 year, Allard Law program at UBC gives Afghan women judges a new professional home

February 27, 2024

As soon as the Taliban took over Afghanistan in 2021, the ultraconservative regime began restricting women’s human rights and persecuting women judges, who were forced to hide or flee in fear for their lives. As part of a collective international effort to help support these women judges from Afghanistan, the Peter A. Allard School of Law at UBC launched the Allard Law Afghan Women Judges Program. That program celebrated its one-year anniversary on Feb. 9 with an event at Peter A. Allard School of Law on the Vancouver campus.

The program began in November 2022 with three Afghan women judges taking up appointments at Allard Law. Judge Bibi Wahida Rahimi accepted a two-year position as a research associate, funded through contributions from Allard Law, the Office of Global Engagement through the UBC Scholars At Risk Advisory Committee and UBC’s Centre for Feminist Legal Studies. Judges Freshta Masomi and Zamila Sangar initially took up appointments as visiting scholars with the Centre for Asian Legal Studies. More recently, Judges Masomi and Sangar accepted positions as research associates at Allard Law for a one-year term. This past summer, Judge Rahimi began an LLM in Human Rights at Indiana’s University of Notre Dame in the U.S. “We’re delighted for Judge Rahimi to embark on this new opportunity and to welcome Judges Masomi and Sangar to their new roles as research associates,” says Dr. Graham Reynolds, Associate Dean, Research and International at Allard Law. Read more.

(From left) Afghan Judges Freshta Masomi, Zamila Sangar and Wahida Rahimi at the Peter A. Allard School of Law at UBC. On Feb. 9, Allard Law celebrated the one-year anniversary of its Afghan Women Judges Program (photo: Macy Yap)