Court sentences four to death in Kabul lynching case

Farkhunda was lynched to death in public after she was falsely accused of desecrating the Holy Quran


Afp May 06, 2015 1 min read
The body of Farkhunda, 27, who was lynched by an angry mob in central Kabul, was carried to the graveyard by women amid crowds of men. PHOTO: AP

KABUL: An Afghan court on Wednesday sentenced four men to death for the public lynching in Kabul of a 27-year-old woman falsely accused of burning the Quran.

Judge Safiullah Mojaddidi, announcing the verdict in a case which sparked a public outcry, said Zainul Abiddin, Mohammad Yaqub, Mohammad Sharif and Abdul Bashir would be hanged.

On Sunday, the video of a mob killing the Afghan woman accused of burning pages from Quran was shown in court in the trial of nearly 50 people.

Read: Afghan court shows video of mob lynching woman in Kabul

The judge asked prosecutors on the second day of the trial to play footage, shot with mobile phone cameras, of a crowd kicking and beating the 27-year-old woman, named Farkhunda.

Read: Afghan mob lynches, burns woman to death in Kabul

A total of 49 men, including several police officers, are on trial in the killing.

Read: Afghans bury woman beaten to death by mob

The police are accused of standing by and allowing the mob to kill the woman in broad daylight.

The attack proved a polarising incident in Afghanistan.

Some say the killing was a defence of Islam. Many others were outraged at the viciousness of the attack, even before an investigation showed that Farkhunda had been falsely accused of desecrating the Quran.

Read: Afghan woman lynched over Quran-burning was innocent: minister

Several protests against violence against women sprang up in Kabul, including one in the past week that re-enacted the attack.

Read: Afghan Taliban vow to punish those responsible for lynching woman

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