‘What about Kashmir?’ Fatima Bhutto calls out Angelina Jolie’s selective activism for Afghanistan

Angelina Jolie joined Instagram three days ago to voice support for displaced Afghans, women and children under Taliban regime.

Fatima Bhutto calls out Angelina Jolie’s selective activism for Afghanistan

Hollywood superstar Angelina Jolie, who is also an envoy for the UNHCR, recently debuted on Instagram for the sake of displaced Afghans after the Taliban takeover and promised to amplify their voices.

However, writer and columnist Fatima Bhutto, who was also born in Kabul, has shared her reservations regarding Jolie’s seemingly well-intended move. She has expressed her wish for the actor to talk about Kashmir and Palestine as well, since it only makes sense to call attention to the plight of those suffering around the world, instead of simply focusing on one region.

Taking to Twitter sharing Jolie’s quote, Bhutto said, “Judging by some leading feminists and actresses, Afghanistan was a paradise until last week.” In a follow-up she added, “Thanks so much, do Palestine next.” In a third tweet she continued to ask, “Has anyone told her about Kashmir?”

In an earlier tweet, Bhutto has asserted that the “West has always excelled in PR, hugging babies, crying on TV, prancing around in burqas.” According to her, they are “bending over backwards in Afghanistan to shape the story and cover their catastrophic incompetence, callousness and corruption. Won’t work. Your failure will haunt you.”

The Maleficent star’s first post on the photo-sharing app featured a hand-written letter she was sent by a teenage girl in Afghanistan, who had penned down her fear of attending school under the Taliban regime.

“Right now, the people of Afghanistan are losing their ability to communicate on social media and to express themselves freely,” Jolie wrote in the caption of the post. “So I’ve come on Instagram to share their stories and the voices of those across the globe, fighting for their basic human rights.”

She added, “I was on the border of Afghanistan two weeks before 9/11, where I met Afghan refugees who had fled the Taliban. This was twenty years ago. It is sickening to watch Afghans being displaced yet again out of the fear and uncertainty that has gripped their country. To spend so much time and money, to have bloodshed and lives lost only to come to this, is a failure almost impossible to understand,” she added.

Speaking about the suffering in Afghanistan, the Eternals actor wrote, “Watching for decades how Afghan refugees – some of the most capable people in the world – are treated like a burden is also sickening.”

Jolie shared a second post on her motivations behind working for the betterment of the displaced, “I started working with displaced people because I believe passionately in human rights. Not out of charity, but out of a deep respect for them and their families, and all they continue to overcome, despite so much persecution, inequality and injustice.”