Afghanistan is reportedly ready to reintroduce public stoning as a punishment for adultery. The move is considered another sign that human rights victories over the past decade are eroding as foreign troops begin leaving.
“We are working on the draft of a sharia penal code where the punishment for adultery, if there are four eyewitnesses, is stoning,” Rohullah Qarizada, a member of the Islamic law committee that is working on the draft, told Reuters.
According to the AFP, the new penal code draft includes an article which reads, “Men and women who commit adultery shall be punished based on the circumstances to one of the following punishments: lashing, stoning [to death].” Another article says that the stoning will be public, while another says that unmarried adulterers would get 100 lashes.
When the Taliban ruled the country from 1996 to 2001, adulterers were stoned or shot. Women could also not be out alone and girls couldn’t go to school. The current punishment for adultery is a long prison sentence.
In order for the stoning law to be approved, it would still have to pass Parliament and be signed by the president, but just the very suggestion of it has the Human Rights Watch and other rights groups angry.
“It is absolutely shocking that 12 years after the fall of the Taliban government, the Karzai administration might bring back stoning as a punishment,” HRW Asia director Brad Adams told Reuters.
Qarizada said that the UN and U.S. do know about the law and he said that there are safeguards to make sure stoning doesn’t become common. “The judge asks each witness many questions and if one answer differs from other witnesses then the court will reject the claim,” he said.