Ahead of International Women’s Day, the Council decided to sanction 9 individuals and 3 entities due to their involvement in committing human rights abuses, specifically towards women and girls. This response is part of the EU’s overarching Global Human Rights Sanction Regime, which was established in 2020 and sanctions those who commit crimes against humanity, genocide, sexual and gender-based violence, torture, and many other abuses. Those sanctioned will be subject to a travel ban within the EU, an asset freeze within the EU, and are prohibited from receiving any funding from persons or entities within the EU.

Those listed are:

• Neda Mohammad Nadeem, Acting Taliban Minister for Higher Education
• Sheikh Muhammad Khalid Hanafi, Acting Taliban Minister for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice

(Both are behind decrees that bar women from education and dissolve their freedom of expression).

• Alexander Georgievich Fedorinov, Ivan Ryabov, Nikolay Anatolevich Kuznetsov, and Ramil Rakhmatulovich Ibatullin, 

(These are all members of the Moscow Police Station or the Russian armed forces responsible for arbitrary arrests and torture within Russia or sexual and gender-based violence in Ukraine).

• Gatluak Nyang Hoth and Gordon Koang Biel 

(Both are commanders of South Sudanese militias responsible for systematic sexual and gender-based violence as a war tactic).

• Toe Ui, Deputy Minister of Home Affairs in Myanmar/Burma

(Responsible for arbitrary detention and torture, as well as systematic sexual and gender-based violence).

• Qarchak Prison in Iran, the Syrian Republican Guard, and the Office of the Chief of Military Security Affairs in Myanmar/Burma

(Responsible for inhumane or degrading treatment and widespread sexual and gender-based violence).