Biden’s Afghanistan: Taliban Bans MMA
The Taliban terrorist organization ruling Afghanistan confirmed on Wednesday that it had formally banned mixed martial arts (MMA), a sport that began thriving in the country in the final years before the fall of Kabul in 2021.
The edict banning MMA followed the publication of an extensive decree last week by the Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice listing a host of new prohibitions on the private lives of Afghans. The decree officially banned women from showing their faces or using their voices in public and mandated beards and “Islamic” haircuts on men, among other restrictions.
MMA was a nascent sport in Afghanistan when, following the disastrous decision by leftist American President Joe Biden to extend the 20-year Afghan War beyond an agreed-upon May 2021 deadline, the Taliban seized control of Kabul and the Afghan federal government. The Taliban has remained the uncontested ruling power in Afghanistan since, although it has not received formal recognition as such from any other country nor from the United Nations.
The Agence France-Presse (AFP) confirmed the MMA ban with Taliban officials on Wednesday.
“It was found that the sport is problematic with respect to sharia and it has many aspects which are contradictory to the teachings of Islam,” the Taliban’s sports agency said in a statement. “That’s why this decision has been made to ban mixed martial arts in Afghanistan.” (Read more from “Biden’s Afghanistan: Taliban Bans MMA” HERE)
