Suhaila Siddiq

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Lieutenant General
Suhaila Siddiq
Minister of Public Health of Afghanistan
In office
December 2001 – 2004
PresidentHamid Karzai
Personal details
Born(1938-03-11)11 March 1938
Kabul, Afghanistan
Died4 December 2020(2020-12-04) (aged 71)

Suhaila Siddiq (11 March 1949

Mohammed Zahir Shah
.

Early life and education

General Suhaila was born in Kabul, Afghanistan. She was born on March 11, her exact birth year is unknown, believed to be either 1938 or 1949.

Pashtun lineage.[3][4]
She was one of six daughters; her father was a governor of Kandahar.

After completing high school, she attended Kabul Medical University but completed her medical studies at Moscow State University in what was then the Soviet Union.[5]

Careers

During the government of

Taliban. Under the Taliban, she kept up the instruction of medicine for women, and managed to reopen the women's section of the hospital where she worked, after the Taliban had closed it.[6]

Habiba Sorabi
.

Siddiq was well respected by many Afghan feminists for her actions during the Taliban era. Both she and her sister Sidiqa, who was a professor at the Kabul Polytechnical Institute, were two of very few women who successfully refused to wear the burka. She is quoted as having said, "When the religious police came with their canes and raised their arms to hit me, I raised mine to hit them back. Then they lowered their arms and let me go."[6]

After the removal of the Taliban government from Afghanistan by the

United States and British Armed Forces, Siddiq was appointed as the Minister of Public Health and sworn in by Interim President Hamid Karzai. One of her first acts was to request help from the international community for the establishment of a medical work force of women. She met a team from the World Health Organization (WHO) that was sent to the war-torn country to assess its health needs, and said that the training of Afghan women is key because they are a crucial asset in the health system.[7]

As minister, in April 2002, Siddiq oversaw the

AIDS in Afghanistan to Eurasianet in New York City.[10]

Personal life and death

Siddiq lived all her life in Afghanistan. She never married and claimed she was too dedicated to her profession and didn't have time for a husband: "I didn't marry because I didn't want to take orders from a man".

Ob/Gyn. Her other sisters reside in San Diego, Geneva, and Sydney. One of her other younger sisters, Sediqa, an engineer passed in 2001 in Kabul.[11]

Siddiq had Alzheimer's disease.[2] She died from complications of COVID-19 in Kabul on 4 December 2020, at the age of 72, during the COVID-19 pandemic in Afghanistan.[12]

References

  1. ^ a b Haqiqat
  2. ^ a b Faizi, Fatima; Gibbons-Neff, Thomas (5 December 2020). "Suhaila Siddiq, Afghanistan's First Female General, Is Dead". The New York Times. Retrieved 10 December 2020.
  3. ^ "In Leadership - US Aid". Archived from the original on 2011-10-21. Retrieved 2011-08-06.
  4. ^ Interim Government 2001–02 - Afghan Land
  5. ^ a b "'We Can Only Rely On Ourselves To Rebuild Our Country'". Newsweek. December 20, 2001. Retrieved 2011-08-05.
  6. ^
    ISBN 978-1-84408-047-2
    , 92.
  7. ^ Los Angeles Times, Health Minister Stresses Training for Women. December 29, 2001
  8. ^ "News Notes Afghanistan - UNICEF.org". Archived from the original on 2015-09-12. Retrieved 2007-12-07.
  9. ^ "English.people.com". Archived from the original on 2005-03-27. Retrieved 2007-12-07.
  10. ^ Eurasianet.org
  11. ^ "Profile: Suhaila Siddiq". BBC News. 2001-12-06. Retrieved 2007-12-01.
  12. ^ "Former health minister, first woman general Dr. Suhaila passes away". Pajhwok Afghan News. 4 December 2020. Retrieved 10 December 2020.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Suhaila Seddiqi.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Suhaila_Siddiq&oldid=1149536041"