Women | Chatham House gave its annual prize to goalkeeper Elaha Safdari on behalf of Afghan women, Afghanistan International reported; no other source has confirmed it

ACW | November 10, 2026 — Chatham House presented its annual prize to Elaha Safdari, goalkeeper of Afghanistan's women's national football team, on behalf of Afghan women in London on Monday, Afghanistan International reported.

The institute said Afghan women had resisted restrictions through civil protest, underground education, documenting rights abuses and support networks, according to the outlet. The prize honours their collective resistance, the institute said.

Chatham House has not yet published details of the ceremony on its website. No other source has confirmed the report so far. The Taliban have not commented in published reports.

Chatham House announced on August 20, 2026, that the 2026 prize would go to the women of Afghanistan for their "courage and resilience in the face of systematic gender persecution." Their courage "challenges the rest of the world not to look away," director Bronwen Maddox said.

Background: The prize was launched in 2005, and past winners include Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Médecins Sans Frontières and the Committee to Protect Journalists, KabulNow reported. The UN recently described Taliban curbs on Afghan women as severe and sweeping.

Why it matters: The situation of Afghan women has "tragically fallen off the radar of the international community," Chietigj Bajpaee, a senior research fellow at Chatham House, said in the institute's August statement.

ACW will continue to follow this story.

Sources: Afghanistan International — Chatham House awards annual prize to Elaha Safdari on behalf of Afghan women (Dari); Chatham House (background) — 2026 Chatham House Prize awarded to the women of Afghanistan; KabulNow (background) — Afghan women awarded Chatham House Prize

Photo: Chatham House (CC BY 2.0), Wikimedia Commons (illustrative)