Afghan Women Network was started in 1995 by Afghan women as the first independent and non-partisan organization of groups and individual women; providing platform for Afghan women to raise their voices for peace and human rights. AWN worked for five years without any major support from donors, the work was mainly supported by individual member’s volunteer work and member NGOs’ support. Since 2002, AWN as a network for women has formally establishment its work within Afghanistan and is registered with ministry of Economic as a women advocacy organization and coordination body for women’s groups, where 57 NGOs are registered under its umbrella.

Since its establishment AWN has organized many important projects in order to support the stance of Afghan women nationally and internationally. Some of the recent major project beside several advocacy and lobbying work has been research on women situation in prisons in four major cities, facilitating consultation on draft law on "eradication of violence against women" and pursuing campaign of eradicating violence against women in eight provinces. AWN has three offices for women in Heart, Jalalabad and Peshawar (for refugee community in exile) and reaches thousands of other women around the country through lobby and women’s rights awareness work, through support of our members and friends. AWN has been pioneer organization on women rights issue supporting women vision transformation to a vocal and conscious activism from a service delivery status.