Taliban Kill a Lovelorn Couple in Afghanistan

Recently a couple that fell in love and planned to run away to get married faced a public execution at the hands of the Taliban in Afghanistan.

On Monday, a couple in love were publicly ‘executed’ when they admitted to an attempt to run away and get married. The man, just 21 and the woman, 19, were publicly shot dead in front of a mosque in the south-western province of Nimroz. The AFP news agency covering the incident was told by Governor Ghulam Dastageer Azad that the actions of the couple went against the tenets of Islam. A local decree said that it was an ‘insult to Islam’. The Governor said,

An unmarried young boy and an unmarried girl who loved each other and wanted to get married had eloped because their families would not approve the marriage. Three Taliban mullahs brought them to the local mosque and they passed a fatwa (religious decree) that they must be killed. They were shot and killed in front of the mosque in public.

The Taliban’s hold is strong in this region and it is almost a Wild West kind of scenario where the rule of the gun prevails over the law. Under the Taliban’s interpretation of Sharia (Islamic religious law), any public contact between the opposite genders is not only banned but is also punishable by harsh punishments. Killings and floggings in the public eye are the norm rather than an exception. The Sharia pervades the day-to-day life, including politics, economics, banking, business, contracts, family, sexuality, hygiene, and social issues. One unsavory aspect is that Sharia strongly leans in favor of the males as females are subjugated. Unmarried men and women are prohibited from contact in public and women. Even talking is a punishable offence. They are also not allowed out of their homes without a male relative. Girls are discouraged from going to school.