Taliban supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada has stated that he will resume the practice of stoning women to death for adultery. A report in the Telegraph quoted the Taliban supreme leader speaking on state television saying the following:
“You say it’s a violation of women’s rights when we stone them to death,” said Mullah Hibatullah Akhundzada in a message clearly addressed to Western officials. “But we will soon implement the punishment for adultery. We will flog women in public. We will stone them to death in public.”
Human rights activists have greeted the Taliban leader’s words with horror. Speaking to the Guardian, Safia Arefi, a lawyer and head of the Afghan human rights organisation Women’s Window of Hope, said. “With this announcement by the Taliban leader, a new chapter of private punishments has begun and Afghan women are experiencing the depths of loneliness.”
Arefi also accused the international community of standing by as the Taliban delivered these punishments.
Women’s rights have already been severely curtailed since the Taliban came back to power in August 2021. They shut down education for girls and women, along with jobs for women by 2022. Women are also not allowed to play sports.
The UN said in a statement on International Women’s Day on March 9 that the country had become the most repressive for women and girls in the world since 2021. They added that Afghanistan’s new rulers have shown an almost “singular focus on imposing rules that leave most women and girls effectively trapped in their homes.”
Think-tanks and international watchdogs warn that with the Taliban’s coming, the suicide rate for women and girls has increased. The Wilson Centre, in a report in 2023, stated that almost 80% of suicide attempts in Afghanistan were made by women and that women made up more than three quarters of reported suicide deaths in the country.
