A rare case of justice: life has improved for the women of Afghanistan since 2001. But there's still a long way to go.

• Author: Bowley, Graham
• Position: INTERNATIONAL

After Sahar Gul was forced to marry at age 13, her in-laws tortured her and kept her in a dirty, windowless cellar for months until the police discovered her lying there in hay and animal dung. In July, an Afghan court upheld prison sentences of 10 years each for three of her in-laws, a decision seen as a legal triumph underscoring the advances for women's rights in the past decade.

But Sahar Gul's case, which drew shock and attention from Afghan President Hamid Karzai and the international news media, is a small victory that masks a still-depressing picture of widespread abuse of Afghan women that never comes to light.

And with U.S. troops set to withdraw from Afghanistan by the end of 2014, many fear that the gains in women's rights that have been made over the past decade will be lost. When the troops leave, so will much of the international attention and money being pumped into Afghanistan.

"If you take away that funding and pressure," says Heather Barr of Human Rights Watch, the progress on women's rights "is not sustainable."

Before the U.S.-led invasion of Mghanistan ousted the radical Muslim Taliban regime in late 2001, following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, Afghan women endured severe restrictions: Girls were barred from school and women were prohibited from working. In areas controlled by the Afghan government and protected by U.S. and NATO forces, those bans have been lifted and women have run for office, taken government posts, and become more involved in Afghan society.

The 2004 Constitution guarantees women equal rights. In 2009, a new law banned violence against women and set new penalties for rape, underage and forced marriage, and other abuses. Many more girls are in school.

Much remains to be done. Women abused by their husbands or families too often end up in jail instead of their abusers. More than half of Afghan girls are still not in school, and of those who are, few will stay long enough to graduate from high school. Girls have been attacked and even doused with acid to be kept from attending classes. (Across the border in Pakistan, the Taliban last month shot and critically wounded a 14-year-old girl who had fought for girls' education in that country.)

It is not uncommon, especially in rural areas, for families to trade daughters into marriage or prostitution to settle debts. The continuing use of the practice, known as baad, is a sign both of Afghans' lack of faith in the government's justice system, which they...