Taliban authorities carried out the public execution of two men convicted of murder at a soccer stadium in eastern Afghanistan on Thursday, an AFP journalist noted.
The two men were shot several times in the back at a stadium in the city of Ghazni, where thousands of men had gathered to watch the executions.
“These two individuals were convicted of murder… after two years of trial by the courts of this country, and the (execution) order was signed,” the country's supreme leader, Hibatullah Akhundzada, a senior Supreme Court official, Atiqullah Darwish, said the crowd.
The victims' families present at the stadium refused to pardon the two murderers, as they were entitled to do under Sharia law, Islamic law.
The Information and Culture Department of Ghazni Province had previously noted that these executions were ordered based on the Islamic principle of “Qisas,” or the law of retribution, without providing details about the convicts and their crimes.
Public executions were frequent during the first Taliban regime between 1996 and 2001. Depending on the crime charged, convicts were most often killed by shooting or stoning.
There have been two executions since 2021, each for murder. Most recently, in June in Laghman Province (East), a man convicted of murdering five people was executed by shooting on the grounds of a mosque in front of around 2,000 people.
Authorities also carried out several public floggings for other crimes such as theft, adultery, and drinking alcohol.
In November 2022, Supreme Leader Hibatullah Akhundzada ordered judges to apply all aspects of Sharia (Islamic law), including public executions for murder in the name of “qisas,” but also corporal punishment (stoning, flogging, amputation of limbs). .
After returning to power, the Taliban promised to be more flexible in applying sharia law, but they have largely returned to the extremely strict interpretation of Islam that marked their first rise to power.