Editing Taliban (section)

=== Cultural genocide ===
The Taliban have committed a [[cultural genocide]] against the Afghan people by destroying their historical and cultural texts, artifacts and sculptures.<ref name="RAWA2022">{{Cite web|title=Afghan Taliban leader orders destruction of ancient statues|url=http://www.rawa.org/statues.htm|access-date=10 January 2022|website=www.rawa.org}}</ref>

In the early 1990s, the [[National Museum of Afghanistan]] was attacked and looted numerous times, resulting in the loss of 70% of the 100,000 artifacts of [[Culture of Afghanistan|Afghan culture]] and [[History of Afghanistan|history]] which were then on display.<ref name="NYT">{{Cite news |last=Burns |first=John F. |date=30 November 1996 |title=Kabul's Museum: The Past Ruined by the Present |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1996/11/30/world/kabul-s-museum-the-past-ruined-by-the-present.html}}</ref>

On 11 August 1998, the Taliban destroyed the [[Puli Khumri]] Public Library. The library contained a collection of over 55,000 books and old manuscripts, one of the most valuable and beautiful collections of Afghanistan's cultural works according to the Afghan people.<ref name="Acta Academia">{{Cite web |last=Civallero |first=Edgardo |year=2007 |title=When memory is turn into ashes |url=https://www.aacademica.org/edgardo.civallero/113.pdf |access-date=2 January 2021 |publisher=Acta Academia}}</ref><ref name="antoon">''[https://books.google.com/books?id=4DlMSrtOGLIC Censorship of historical thought: a world guide, 1945–2000]'', Antoon de Baets</ref>

On 2 March 2001, the Buddhas of Bamiyan were destroyed with dynamite, on orders from the Taliban's leader Mullah Omar.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Shah |first=Amir |date=3 March 2001 |title=Taliban destroy ancient Buddhist relics – International pleas ignored by Afghanistan's Islamic fundamentalist leaders |work=The Independent |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/taliban-destroy-ancient-buddhist-relics-694425.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110106181318/http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/taliban-destroy-ancient-buddhist-relics-694425.html |archive-date=6 January 2011}}</ref>

In October of the same year, the Taliban "took sledgehammers and axes to thousands of years’ worth of artifacts"<ref name="Anderson-2-2022" /> in the National Museum of Afghanistan, destroying at least 2,750 ancient works of art.<ref>{{Cite web |date=23 November 2001 |title=Taliban destroyed museum exhibits |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/1363272/Taliban-destroyed-museum-exhibits.html |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220110/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/1363272/Taliban-destroyed-museum-exhibits.html |archive-date=10 January 2022 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live |work=The Daily Telegraph}}{{cbignore}}</ref>

Afghanistan has a rich musical culture, where [[Music of Afghanistan|music]] plays an important part in social functions like births and marriages and it has also played a major role in uniting an ethnically diverse country.<ref name="The Guardian" /> However, since it came to power and even after it was deposed, the Taliban has banned most music, including cultural folk music, and it has also attacked and killed a number of musicians.<ref name="The Guardian" /><ref name="Free Muse">{{Cite news |date=26 September 2005 |title=Afghanistan: Seven musicians killed by gunmen |work=Free Muse |url=https://freemuse.org/news/afghanistan-seven-musicians-killed-by-gunmen/ |access-date=6 January 2021 |archive-date=8 January 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210108071800/https://freemuse.org/news/afghanistan-seven-musicians-killed-by-gunmen/ |url-status=dead }}</ref><ref name="The Guardian-music">{{Cite news |last=Rasmussen |first=Sune Engel |date=25 May 2015 |title=He was the saviour of Afghan music. Then a Taliban bomb took his hearing |work=The Guardian |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/may/25/he-was-the-saviour-of-afghan-music-then-a-taliban-bomb-took-his-hearing}}</ref><ref name="RFERL">{{Cite news |date=15 June 2009 |title=Taliban Attacks Musicians At Afghan Wedding |publisher=Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty |url=https://www.rferl.org/a/Taliban_Attacks_Musicians_At_Afghan_Wedding/1754647.html}}</ref>