September 23, 2021
Taliban leader Mullah Nooruddin Turabi poses for a photo in Kabul,
Afghanistan, on Sept. 22, 2021. Mullah Turabi, one of the founders of
the Taliban, says the hard-line movement will once again carry out
punishments like executions and amputations of hands, though perhaps not
in public. (AP Photo/Felipe Dana)
A top Taliban official in Afghanistan said that the extremist group that now rules the country will
carry out executions and the amputations of hands and feet. Speaking to The Associated Press, Taliban co-founder Mullah Nooruddin
Turabi dismissed criticism of the group’s previous rule of Afghanistan between
1996 and 2001, where public executions, floggings, stonings, and amputations
were commonplace. Turabi, who lost an eye and a leg fighting against
Soviet invaders in the 1980s, is the head of the new Ministry of
Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice and is in charge of enforcing
punishments. “Everyone
criticized us for the punishments in the stadium, but we have never said
anything about their laws and their punishments,” Turabi told the Associated
Press in a report published Thursday. “No one will tell us what our laws should
be. We will follow Islam and we will make our laws on the Quran.” During the
Taliban’s rule more than 20 years ago, convicted murderers were executed by a
single shot to the head and typically by the victim’s family—sometimes in
stadiums and in other public arenas. Convicted thieves face the amputation of
their hand, and for those who are convicted of highway robbery, a foot and a
hand were cut off. In a change
from a previous Taliban rule, Turabi told the outlet that female judges will
now be able to adjudicate cases. But the foundation of the South Asian county’s
laws will be its interpretation of the Quran, he said.
Defending the
prior Taliban rule, which allowed for the harboring of terrorist networks
including al-Qaeda, Turabi told AP: “We had complete safety in every part of
the country.” He pointed to the group’s public punishment methods, saying they
deter crime. But already,
human rights groups such as Amnesty International have said the Taliban is
“steadily dismantling” human rights gains made during the past 20 years. That includes the “targeted killings of
civilians and surrendered soldiers and the blockading of humanitarian supplies
in the Panjshir Valley, which constitute crimes under international law,” said Amnesty on Tuesday. “Restrictions have also been reimposed on
women, freedom of expression, and civil society.”
The Taliban,
which is described by some U.S. intelligence agencies as a terrorist group, took
over Afghanistan in a matter of days after a blistering offensive. The takeover
was preceded by the U.S. military’s total withdrawal from the country, which
morphed into a rushed and chaotic evacuation effort that saw thousands of
Afghan nationals and Americans flee the country via airplanes. Some senators
have expressed concern that the Taliban, as it captured the country, was able
to seize billions of dollars’ worth of U.S. military hardware including Black
Hawk helicopters, weapons, and other technology
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