Taliban Won't Rule Out Cutting Off Hands as Punishment
By: Jenni Fink (MSN)
And back in time they go...................
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
The Taliban are offering promises of a regime that will differ from the one that controlled Afghanistan in the 1990s, but a spokesperson wouldn't rule out suspected thieves being punished by having their hands cut off.
© Karim Jaafar/AFP/Getty Images Suhail Shaheen, spokesman for the Taliban, told NPR he couldn't comment on whether the Taliban would use the punishment of cutting off people's hands. Shaheen attends the Intra Afghan Dialogue talks in the Qatari capital Doha on July 7, 2019.
After forcibly taking over the country last weekend, the Taliban held a press conference on Tuesday where they said the new Afghanistan will be freer than the one they previously ruled. There will be no retribution for those who held government positions or helped American forces, and women would be allowed to work and attend school, but it would all occur under the confines of Sharia, or Islamic law.
Under the harsh interpretation of Islamic law that the Taliban followed when governing in the 1990s, thieves and suspected thieves had their hands and feet cut off. This often occurred in public, and at times the severed body part would be paraded before a crowd.
When NPR reporter A Martinez asked Suhail Shaheen, a Taliban spokesperson, if the punishment would be part of the Taliban's new rule, he left the door open to that possibility.
"I can say the Islamic rule is interpreted by the judges. Everyone has the right of defense. Then [the judge] can issue the ruling as per the Islamic law. So I have no comment on that," Shaheen said.
The Taliban revived the punishment in the 2010s in areas they controlled. In July, Gul Rahim, a Taliban judge, told German newspaper Bild that he used the punishment in his latest cases. In the case of a man who broke into a house and stole a golden ring, Rahim said, he ordered that the man's hand be chopped off. Then, he said, he asked if the owner wanted the man's leg to be chopped off since he committed two crimes by breaking into the house and stealing the ring.
Taliban fighters took over Kabul, Afghanistan's capital, after little resistance, and their rise to power caused a chaotic rush of people to the airport in an attempt to flee the country. It resulted in the deaths of several people, who attempted to escape by clinging to the side of a U.S. military plane as it was taking off.
At Tuesday's press conference, spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid offered promises that the Taliban, which is a U.S. state-sanctioned terrorist organization, had changed. He said embassies would have "complete security," private media would be "free and independent" and women would be working "shoulder to shoulder with us."
However, all of Mujahid's promises were couched in statements like "within the framework of Sharia" and "within our culture frameworks." This leaves the Taliban with the option of restricting freedoms, under their interpretation of Islamic law, that people had enjoyed before the organization's return to power.
Given the group's history and the disclaimers peppered throughout the press conference, many doubt that the Taliban's rule will be any different from its 1990s regime.
"For the time being—understandable given their past history—these declarations have been met with skepticism. There have been chilling reports of human rights abuses on the rights of individuals," Rupert Colville, a spokesperson for the U.N. high commissioner for human rights, said Tuesday.
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Everything old is new again.
Meanwhile our 'friends' in Saudi Arabia do much worse and barely a whimper ... think I will wait before rushing to judgement on the 'new' school.
And there's the Taliban's real intent.
Taliban restrictions and mistreatment of women include the:
1- Complete ban on women's work outside the home, which also applies to female teachers, engineers and most professionals. Only a few female doctors and nurses are allowed to work in some hospitals in Kabul.
2- Complete ban on women's activity outside the home unless accompanied by a mahram (close male relative such as a father, brother or husband).
3- Ban on women dealing with male shopkeepers.
4- Ban on women being treated by male doctors.
5- Ban on women studying at schools, universities or any other educational institution. (Taliban have converted girls' schools into religious seminaries.)
6- Requirement that women wear a long veil (Burqa), which covers them from head to toe.
7- Whipping, beating and verbal abuse of women not clothed in accordance with Taliban rules, or of women unaccompanied by a mahram.
8- Whipping of women in public for having non-covered ankles.
9- Public stoning of women accused of having sex outside marriage. (A number of lovers are stoned to death under this rule).
10- Ban on the use of cosmetics. (Many women with painted nails have had fingers cut off).
11- Ban on women talking or shaking hands with non-mahram males.
12- Ban on women laughing loudly. (No stranger should hear a woman's voice).
13- Ban on women wearing high heel shoes, which would produce sound while walking. (A man must not hear a woman's footsteps.)
14- Ban on women riding in a taxi without a mahram.
15- Ban on women's presence in radio, television or public gatherings of any kind.
16- Ban on women playing sports or entering a sport center or club.
17- Ban on women riding bicycles or motorcycles, even with their mahrams.
18- Ban on women's wearing brightly colored clothes. In Taliban terms, these are "sexually attracting colors."
19- Ban on women gathering for festive occasions such as the Eids, or for any recreational purpose.
20- Ban on women washing clothes next to rivers or in a public place.
21- Modification of all place names including the word "women." For example, "women's garden" has been renamed "spring garden".
22- Ban on women appearing on the balconies of their apartments or houses.
23- Compulsory painting of all windows, so women can not be seen from outside their homes.
24- Ban on male tailors taking women's measurements or sewing women's clothes.
25- Ban on female public baths.
26- Ban on males and females traveling on the same bus. Public buses have now been designated "males only" (or "females only").
27- Ban on flared (wide) pant-legs, even under a burqa.
28- Ban on the photographing or filming of women.
29- Ban on women's pictures printed in newspapers and books, or hung on the walls of houses and shops.
Your list is tragically true. Anyone who thinks that women and young girls are "free" under Sharia Law doesn't know anything about Islam, especially radical Islam.
Re: cutting off hands for theft ... anyone who has read a real Koran - not the westernized version - knows that this punishment still exists.
Islamic law as interpreted by the Taliban will put Afghanistan back into the stone age. Except of course for the rulers who will continue to enjoy the trappings of western civilization like running water and clean food.
Sharia law does have it's positives, mask mandates!
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