Chevening Scholarship For Afghan Students Resumed By UK Government

The court said that the men were punished with 30 to 39 lashes on charges of extramarital affairs and same-sex relations.

On Thursday, November 14, the Supreme Court of the Taliban released a newsletter on X social media platform, in which it has been stated that the Criminal Court of this group in Ghanikhel district of Nangarhar province flogged the accused in the presence of local authorities, court clients and the public.

With the return of the Taliban to power in August 2021, punishments such as execution and flogging have returned to Afghanistan. In the latest case, the Taliban, on Wednesday, executed an accused in Paktia province.

In its quarterly report, the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) announced that the Taliban had physically punished 111 people, including 16 women, throughout Afghanistan in the last three months.

UNAMA said that the Taliban had flogged these people individually and sometimes in groups on various charges.

Human rights activists always consider corporal punishments such as flogging and execution as a violation of the basic principles of human rights and against human dignity.

Human rights activists believe that Taliban courts do not allow defendants to use services such as access to a defence lawyer. In many cases, defendants appear in court without legal advice and a defence attorney, which is a clear violation of the right to defence and does not allow the individual to exercise his rights in the trial process.

According to human rights activists, Taliban courts are held, in many cases, without transparency, and the media and independent institutions do not have access to information about the trial process and verdicts.

The report shows that over the past three years, at least 98 LGBTQIA+ individuals have been publicly punished on various charges in 14 provinces of Afghanistan.

LGBTQIA+ refers to a range of people with fluid sexual orientations and identities. The Taliban has imposed severe punishments for homosexuality in Afghanistan.

The investigative report, titled "Hidden Crimes", examines the situation of LGBTQIA+ individuals in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan between 2022 and 2024 and shows that Kabul, Kandahar and Khost recorded the highest number of punishments against these individuals with 15 cases.

"The Taliban regime does not recognise the gender of LGBTQIA+ individuals, so the exact gender identity of those convicted and punished is not known," the report said.

The report also emphasises that a number of LGBTQIA+ individuals in Afghanistan have faced death threats for rejecting the "sexual desires" of Taliban members, and some of them have disappeared from Taliban detention centres.

In this report, Rainbow Afghanistan interviewed 12 LGBTQIA+ individuals who have been victims of Taliban violence.

Jannat Gul (pseudonym), who spent eight months in a Taliban prison, told the organisation, "The Taliban wanted us to be with them and establish a relationship, and in return they promised money and support in prison. However, after these requests were rejected, they sexually assaulted us. I remember that four people sexually assaulted me in one night."

"The Taliban decided to make us a lesson for the youth of Herat," he added. They blackened our faces, paraded us around and stated that we should be punished. They drove us around the city from 11 am to 6 pm." The organisation also spoke to several men and women from Jalalabad, Herat, Baghlan, Kabul, Balkh and Logar provinces who recounted the Taliban's mistreatment of LGBTQIA+ individuals.

At the end of its report, Rainbow Afghanistan called for the formation of an international fact-finding committee, diplomatic pressure, monitoring and prosecuting the Taliban, supporting LGBTQIA+ individuals, and recognising sexual and gender apartheid.

Following these talks, Afghan prisoners are supposed to be transferred from Iran to Afghanistan to serve their sentences, Fitrat said.

On Thursday, November 14, Hamdullah Fitrat, the Taliban's deputy spokesman, released an audio tape announcing that an Iranian delegation is scheduled to meet with the group's officials in Kabul to discuss the transfer of prisoners from the two countries.

He expressed hope that as a result of these talks, Afghan prisoners will be able to serve the remainder of their sentences in Afghan prisons.

Earlier, Askar Jalalian, the deputy minister of justice of the Islamic Republic of Iran, announced on Wednesday, November 13, that 1,000 Afghan prisoners would be returned to Afghanistan within the next two months.

He also clarified that he plans to travel to Kabul to discuss with the Taliban about these prisoners as well as the transfer of Iranian prisoners from Afghanistan.

The Taliban has not yet provided details about the composition of the Iranian delegation and the number of Iranian prisoners in Afghanistan.

Iran's deputy justice minister put the number of Iranian prisoners in Afghanistan at less than 10 and said that efforts were underway to transfer them using a "logical and agreed-upon method”.

ISNA news agency reported on Wednesday that the agreement for the transfer of convicts with Afghanistan was signed in 2006 and that the Taliban is also committed to this official agreement.

Previously, some experts have expressed concern about the uncertain future of Afghan prisoners after being transferred to Afghanistan.

Reports say that some of the Afghan prisoners in Iran may be former Afghan government employees or opponents of the Taliban, and the group is likely to treat them in a vindictive manner. There have also been concerns about the release of criminals by the Taliban.

Sources quoted Mujahid as telling Afghanistan International, "The Taliban has no decision to stop the activities of the media."

Following growing concerns over the implementation of Article 17 of the Law on the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice, officials of organisations supporting journalists and media met with Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid in Kabul on Wednesday.

A participant in the meeting told Afghanistan International on Wednesday that media officials had expressed concern over the ban on the publication of images of living beings and photography and called for a review of the decision.

According to sources, Zabihullah Mujahid has assured media officials and journalists that "banning images of living beings will not lead to the cessation of the activity of visual media”.

He did not explain how the ban would not make it virtually impossible for television to operate and that television would not be converted into radio.

The Taliban-controlled government's Media Centre also said in a statement that Mujahid had assured media officials that "the Taliban is committed to freedom of expression and the free operation of the media within the framework of Islam”.

Zabihullah Mujahid also said that the Taliban is aware of the importance of the media in the present era and is fully committed to freedom of expression and media activity within the framework of Islamic principles.

The Taliban have detained several experts critical of the Taliban's policies. The group has often described these criticisms as contrary to national interests.

Mujahid said that the problems of the media in the field of access to information will be addressed.

At the same time, the Afghanistan Journalists Centre announced a new Taliban order banning photography and filming in Nangarhar province and warned of "intensifying repression" and "deteriorating the situation of the media”.

According to Article 17 of the Law on the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice, the publication of images of living beings has been prohibited, and the Taliban has intensified its efforts to implement this law.

The ban is gradually being implemented in Afghanistan's provinces, but visual media is still active in Kabul.

Nangarhar is the fifth province where a ban on publication of living beings and video interviews is officially enforced. Previously, the order was fully implemented in Kandahar, Takhar, Badghis and Helmand provinces.

The United Nations Assistance Mission in Kabul (UNAMA) too said that public executions are contrary to Afghanistan's international human rights obligations and must be stopped.

The Taliban on Wednesday announced that they had publicly executed a man in the capital of Paktia province on charges of "premeditated murder".

"I condemn today's horrific public execution at a sports stadium in Gardez, Afghanistan, as well as other corporal punishments and executions carried out by the Taliban," Richard Bennett, the UN special rapporteur on human rights for Afghanistan, wrote in a response on social media platform X.

"I call on the Taliban to immediately stop these cruel punishments, which are a clear violation of human rights," he added.

In a note, UNAMA also stressed on the need to stop executions in Afghanistan. "Public executions are contrary to Afghanistan's international human rights obligations and must stop," UNAMA said.

UNAMA has also called for respect for the legal process for fair trials.

On Wednesday, November 13, the Taliban's Supreme Court announced that it had executed a man at the Gardez Stadium, the capital of Paktia province, on charges of premeditated murder in the presence of senior officials of the group.

Sirajuddin Haqqani and Khalil-ur-Rehman Haqqani, the Taliban's interior and refugee ministers, were present at the execution, the court said.

Recently, the Taliban's Supreme Court announced that it has executed five people since the group's return to power.

The Taliban has said that about 30 more death sentences are awaiting final approval by Taliban leader Mullah Hibatullah.