Afghan stoning video rekindles outcry

There were hundreds of witnesses. The date, time and place of the attack were well known, and so were the identities of the killers. The crime had even been captured on cellphone videos, and at least one of the recordings reached the authorities within days.

Now one of those videos showing the horror of the killings has been broadcast on Afghan television to the shame of Afghan authorities, who have yet to make a single arrest in the deaths of the 19-year-old woman, Siddiqa, and her fiance, Khayyam, 25, who had tried to elope against their families’ wishes.

The broadcast has suddenly prompted at least the appearance of action by the government. Over the weekend, a Ministry of Interior investigating commission arrived in Kunduz Province, where the stoning was carried out by the Taliban in a village that has since come back under government control.

The police there admit that they now know the identities of the killers—so does nearly everyone in Kunduz Province —but claim that the chief perpetrators have all gone into hiding. But that claim has been questioned because most of the males in the village, Mullah Quli, in the Archi District, took part in the August 15 attack.

Back in August, President Hamid Karzai’s spokesman said  Karzai was “deeply saddened” by the stoning deaths.

Outrage was expressed by many, including human rights groups and the governor of Kunduz Province, and the stonings were condemned as both illegal and inhumane. Even religious scholars who support stoning as a punishment say the way these killings were done was barbaric by any standard.

Only the Taliban, who controlled the village at the time, publicly condoned the killing of Siddiqa and Khayyam, who had a wife and two children.

The video shows the male crowd using not only many large stones, but some so large it is hard to lift them, and often throwing the stones with great force. Siddiqa, dressed in a full blue burqa, was put in a pit to be stoned, but even after a sustained barrage from the crowd pressing close to her, she was still alive and tried to crawl out. Then one of the men shot her three times in the head.

Khayyam was attacked separately, apparently after Siddiqa, but the crowd stoned him so ferociously that he was soon dead.

“The incident happened in public, and everyone in Kunduz was aware of that, including the police,” said Horia Mosadiq, an Afghanistan specialist with Amnesty International. “The shocking thing is the Afghan police are only taking action after the international attention brought to this case.”