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A30 world news
Diabierna 24 September 2021

Taliban official: Strict punishment, executions will return

Under the new Taliban gov- just hundreds, we can reach
ernment, he is in charge of millions,” he said. He added
prisons. He is among a num- that if punishments are made
ber of Taliban leaders, includ- public, then people may be
ing members of the all-male allowed to video or take pho-
interim Cabinet, who are on tos to spread the deterrent ef-
a United Nations sanctions fect.
list.
The U.S. and its allies have
During the previous Tal- been trying to use the threat
iban rule, he was one of the of isolation — and the eco-
group’s most ferocious and nomic damage that would
uncompromising enforcers. result from it — to pressure
When the Taliban took power the Taliban to moderate their
in 1996, one of his first acts rule and give other factions,
was to scream at a woman minorities and women a
journalist, demanding she place in power.
leave a room of men, and to
then deal a powerful slap in But Turabi dismissed criti-
the face of a man who ob- cism over the previous Tal-
jected. iban rule, arguing that it had
succeeded in bringing stabil-
Turabi was notorious for rip- ity. “We had complete safety
ping music tapes from cars, in every part of the country,”
stringing up hundreds of me- he said of the late 1990s.
(AP) — One of the found- Propagation of Virtue and iban fighters have revived a ters of destroyed cassettes in
ers of the Taliban and the Prevention of Vice — effec- punishment they commonly trees and signposts. He de- Even as Kabul residents ex-
chief enforcer of its harsh tively, the religious police — used in the past — public manded men wear turbans press fear over their new Tal-
interpretation of Islamic during the Taliban’s previous shaming of men accused of in all government offices iban rulers, some acknowl-
law when they last ruled rule. small-time theft. and his minions routinely edge grudgingly that the
Afghanistan said the hard- beat men whose beards had capital has already become
line movement will once At that time, the world de- On at least two occasions been trimmed. Sports were safer in just the past month.
again carry out executions nounced the Taliban’s pun- in the last week, Kabul men banned, and Turabi’s legion Before the Taliban takeover,
and amputations of hands, ishments, which took place have been packed into the of enforcers forced men to bands of thieves roamed the
though perhaps not in in Kabul’s sports stadium or back of a pickup truck, their the mosque for prayers five streets, and relentless crime
public. on the grounds of the sprawl- hands tied, and were paraded times daily. had driven most people off
ing Eid Gah mosque, often around to humiliate them. the streets after dark.
In an interview with The attended by hundreds of Af- In one case, their faces were In this week’s interview with
Associated Press, Mullah ghan men. painted to identify them as the AP, Turabi spoke to a “It’s not a good thing to see
Nooruddin Turabi dismissed thieves. In the other, stale woman journalist. these people being shamed in
outrage over the Taliban’s ex- Executions of convicted bread was hung from their public, but it stops the crimi-
ecutions in the past, which murderers were usually by a necks or stuffed in their “We are changed from the nals because when people see
sometimes took place in single shot to the head, car- mouth. It wasn’t immedi- past,” he said. it, they think ‘I don’t want
front of crowds at a stadium, ried out by the victim’s fam- ately clear what their crimes that to be me,’” said Amaan,
and he warned the world ily, who had the option of ac- were. He said now the Taliban a storeowner in the center of
against interfering with Af- cepting “blood money” and would allow television, mo- Kabul. He asked to be identi-
ghanistan’s new rulers. allowing the culprit to live. Wearing a white turban and a bile phones, photos and fied by just one name.
For convicted thieves, the bushy, unkempt white beard, video “because this is the
“Everyone criticized us for punishment was amputation the stocky Turabi limped necessity of the people, and Another shopkeeper said it
the punishments in the sta- of a hand. For those con- slightly on his artificial leg. we are serious about it.” He was a violation of human
dium, but we have never said victed of highway robbery, a He lost a leg and one eye suggested that the Taliban rights but that he was also
anything about their laws and hand and a foot were ampu- during fighting with Soviet saw the media as a way to happy he can open his store
their punishments,” Turabi tated. troops in the 1980s. spread their message. “Now after dark.
told The Associated Press, we know instead of reaching
speaking in Kabul. “No one Trials and convictions were
will tell us what our laws rarely public and the judicia-
should be. We will follow ry was weighted in favor of
Islam and we will make our Islamic clerics, whose knowl-
laws on the Quran.” edge of the law was limited to
religious injunctions.
Since the Taliban over-
ran Kabul on Aug. 15 and Turabi said that this time,
seized control of the coun- judges — including women
try, Afghans and the world — would adjudicate cases,
have been watching to see but the foundation of Af-
whether they will re-create ghanistan’s laws will be the
their harsh rule of the late Quran. He said the same
1990s. Turabi’s comments punishments would be re-
pointed to how the group’s vived.
leaders remain entrenched in
a deeply conservative, hard- “Cutting off of hands is very
line worldview, even if they necessary for security,” he
are embracing technological said, saying it had a deterrent
changes, like video and mo- effect. He said the Cabinet
bile phones. was studying whether to do
punishments in public and
Turabi, now in his early 60s, will “develop a policy.”
was justice minister and head
of the so-called Ministry of In recent days in Kabul, Tal-