KABUL:
A man Afghan officials say is a member of the Taliban shot dead a woman accused of adultery in front of a crowd near Kabul, a video obtained by Reuters showed.
In the three-minute video, a turban-clad man approaches a woman kneeling in the dirt and shoots her five times at close range with an automatic rifle, to cheers of jubilation from the 150 or so men watching in a village in Parwan province.
“Allah warns us not to get close to adultery because it’s the wrong way,” another man says as the shooter gets closer to the woman. “It is the order of Allah that she be executed”.
Provincial Governor Basir Salangi said the video, obtained on Saturday, was shot a week ago in the village of Qimchok in Shinwari district, about an hour’s drive from Kabul.
Such rare public punishment was a painful reminder to Afghan authorities of the Taliban’s 1996-2001 period in power, and it raised concern about the treatment of Afghan women 11 years into the Nato-led war against Taliban insurgents.
“When I saw this video, I closed my eyes ... The woman was not guilty; the Taliban are guilty,” Salangi told Reuters.
When the unnamed woman, most of her body tightly wrapped in a shawl, fell sideways after being shot several times in the head, the spectators chanted: “Long live the Afghan mujahideen!”, a name the Taliban use for themselves.
The Taliban could not be reached for comment.
Published in The Express Tribune, July 8th, 2012.
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"The Taliban could not be reached for comment." you cannot judge an event without listening to both sides.
Barbaric and evil!
the woman was surely not accused of adultery on her own. Where is the punishment for the man ? if there isnt any , why bother calling it adultery (and not just female genocide). How can these people use the name of Islam just to perpetuate their misogyny and barbarism.
I wonder where the people who boast championing the Islamic cause for the region are..? Have some courage and come out, condemn this horrific act against humanity. No religion of the world justifies such an act.
A charge of adultry makes a man accuser, judge, jury and executioner. where were those four witnessess? Pakistan, UAE and KSR were the only countries that recognized tliban government in Afghanistan and would love to see them back in power.
Gotta love the last line in this article! "The Taliban could not be reached for comment."
Did they show a photo of the man that was involved in the adultery. Surely they will execute him also.
"Accused of adultery" no word on a trial, or evidence or... oh right this is Afghanistan.