Afghan trailblazer describes confronting Taliban Fawzia Koofi was hesitant to face the Taliban militants who jailed her husband, threatened to stone her for wearing nail polish, and -- when she became a high-profile MP and women's rights champion -- tried to assassinate her. But the politician and mother of two daughters could not refuse a rare invitation to travel to Moscow earlier this month and stand before her oppressors to declare that Taliban misogyny and prejudice would never again take root in Afghanistan.