Kimberley Motley: Making waves in Afghanistan's legal system
A former American beauty queen who only left the US for the first time four years ago is perhaps an unlikely champion for change in the Afghan legal system.
Press Coverage
Kimberley Motley: Spinning Playlists in Afghanistan and Beyond
Motley performs about 30 percent of her work on a pro bono basis, and she finds ways to navigate the system for clients in countries like Afghanistan, where laws may conflict with culture, religion, or politics, or where laws may not exist at all.
“Laws are just words on a piece of paper,” Motley said. “It’s up to us to bring them to life. They don’t mean anything until we find ways to use them.”
Beauty and the East: The lone foreign lawyer in Afghanistan
“Motley has used the country’s own rules to bring “justness.” Motley describes justness as “using laws for their intended purposes.” Justness is “also the legal reality that I fight on behalf of my clients within the bounds of the law.” Afghan laws meant to protect people are under-enforced, while the reverse is true for laws meant for punishment, she found. This is not a problem unique to the country.”
Outspoken, American and a Woman: Afghanistan’s Only Foreign Litigator Stands Out
“IN almost eight years practicing law here, Ms. Motley has been involved in some of the most important human rights cases of the post-Taliban era. She is perhaps the first independent lawyer to represent a victim of domestic violence in an Afghan court — a woman who had been forced into marriage by her family at the age of 12 and tortured by her husband. And Ms. Motley represented the family of Farkhunda Malikzada, a 27-year-old woman murdered last year after being falsely accused of having burned the Quran.”
Desert Island Discs
Op-Eds
The Mob Killing of Farkhunda was a Defining Moment for Women's Rights in Afghanistan
The Telegraph, 20 May 2015
Our Complacency with War Torn Violence
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, June 28, 2014
Making Good on the 9-1-1 Legacy for Afghan Women
The Daily Beast, September 11, 2013
The Immorality of Afghanistan’s ‘Moral Crimes
Washington Post, January 21, 2012