Feature: Execution of woman by Taliban reveals Afghan women's vulnerability

Abdul Haleem
Tuesday, 10-July-2012

 

KABUL: Amid national and international campaigns to protect women rights in the conflict-ridden Afghanistan, a popular local television Tolo aired a horrific footage of Taliban behavior towards women on Sunday night and Monday morning that shocked all the viewers.

The shocking footage was about the public extra-judicial killing of a poor woman days ago by a group of armed Taliban fighters in a village of Parwan province, 75 km north of Afghan capital Kabul.

"Oh God. I cannot see, it is a barbaric act against humanity," Kabul resident Ahmad Wali said while watching TV.

The one- or two- minute video recording, displayed on mini- screen, was the film of a shawl-wearing woman sitting helplessly on a ground in Shinwari district in the presence of 100 or so Taliban insurgents and spectators.

The woman known as Najiba, 22, was accused of adultery and after verdict by the Taliban judge; a bearded and turbaned man fired several shots killing her on the spot. After execution of the poor woman the jubilant Taliban militants chanted slogans of “long live Taliban, Taliban implement Islamic law".

However, Afghans question of the desert court as biased, saying both the lady and her paramour should have been punished in a legal court if they were found guilty.

The brutal killing of the alleged adulterer by Taliban is taking place amid government efforts to encourage national reconciliation with Taliban to find a negotiated settlement for Afghan crisis, where women rights bodies have warned that any reconciliation with Taliban would negatively affect all the achievements have made over the past decade.

Taliban militants during their reign which was ended by the U.S. -led military campaign in late 2001 had banned schools for girls and confined women to their houses besides awarding public punishment including hands and feet amputation, lashing, stoning and execution.

"The brutal killing of the woman in Parwan reminds the public execution of alleged criminals by Taliban in the national sport stadium in Kabul before their collapse," said another TV watcher Abdul Azim, adding the execution speaks of Taliban sway in the countryside.

Both President Hamid Karzai and his Interior Ministry have strongly condemned the extra-judicial killing of the woman by Taliban in Parwan, vowing to launch a big operation to find the culprits.

"The murder of a woman who has had no voice to rise for her self-defense against the weapon and brutality of a number of criminals is a clear symbol of the cowardice and wickedness of her murderers," Karzai said in a statement released by his office on Monday, adding that "Such a crime is unforgivable in the sacred religion of Islam and the laws of the country."

He instructed the security officials not to spare any efforts in arresting and punishing the perpetrators.

Nonetheless, Afghan ordinary citizens doubt the government's ability to bring to justice the criminals particularly the Taliban fighters.

"It is just an empty promise to comfort the families of the victim and cool down the feeling of the citizens," a 50-year-old lady teacher in Kabul told Xinhua, believing that no one dares to violate human rights particularly the rights of women in Afghanistan if the government had punished the murderers publicly.

Murdering woman in Parwan district is not the first case of Taliban' desert court against women since their regime ouster a decade ago.

Previously, the armed outfit had stoned to death a woman and a man for similar charge in Dasht-e-Archi district of Kunduz province in 2010, after killing two ladies in Ghazni province and lashing another lady in Ghor province couple of years ago.

However, the women status has been considerably improved in the post-Taliban Afghanistan as women serve as parliamentarians, cabinet ministers, artists and traders, the segment is still suffering.

The body of a woman along with two of her children allegedly killed by her husband was taken to hospital in the eastern Ghazni city last Wednesday, head of Ghazni city hospital, Baz Mohammad Humat said.

"The execution of Najiba by Taliban in Parwan is not the first and will not be the last. Such crimes would go unchecked until the government is serious to fight the right abusers," said the lady teacher without giving her name.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

    

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