This is the sixth public execution since their return to power in 2021. Taliban authorities shot three times a man convicted of murder on Wednesday in eastern Afghanistan. The man was shot in the morning in the football stadium of Allez, the capital of the province of Paktia, in front of thousands of spectators.
“It’s an order from God”
“It is an order from God, we are Muslims and we must fulfill it,” Sayedullah, who was in the stands of the 15,000-seat stadium, told AFP. “Before, this was not applied and it was disorder, today, fortunately, we are in an Islamic system,” he continued.
Mobin, another spectator of the execution, said he saw “benefits” in it. “No one will want to kill and no one will kill” after this public punishment, he told AFP. On Tuesday, the governorate called on residents on social networks to “participate in the event”. Several ministers and provincial officials were present in the stadium. The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (Manua) called for an “immediate moratorium” judging that these public executions “contravene Afghanistan’s human rights obligations”.
The execution order was signed by the supreme leader of the Taliban, Emir Hibatullah Akhundzada, who lives secluded in his southern stronghold of Kandahar and governs the country by decree or instructions, the Supreme Court said in a statement. Courts of different jurisdictions had previously examined the case “very carefully and on several occasions,” the Court said.
The victim’s family was consulted to find out if they would forgive the condemned man. In view of his refusal, the execution was ordered under the Islamic principle of “qisas” or law of retaliation, from the same source. A weapon was then given in the stadium to a male member of this family who shot the condemned man three times.
The latter was found guilty of the murder, perpetrated before the Taliban authorities took power. In February, three men were executed in the same week, two in Ghazni in the east, and one in Sheberghan in the north. Before that, a man was shot in December 2022 and a second in June 2023. All were convicted of “murder”.
“Until death”
Public executions were common during the first Taliban regime, between 1996 and 2001. The condemned were most often killed by shooting or stoning, depending on the crimes charged. One of the most striking images of their first regime remains that in 1999 of the execution of a woman wearing a burqa in a large stadium in Kabul, in front of thousands of spectators. She had been convicted of killing her husband.
Since August 2021, authorities have regularly carried out public floggings for other crimes, such as theft, adultery or alcohol consumption. Emir Hibatullah Akhundzada affirmed in August, on the third anniversary of the capture of Kabul, that the application of Islamic law was “a responsibility until death”.
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