Death by stoning for convicted adult adulterers may soon be written into Afghan law, a senior official said on Monday, as reported by Reuters.
"Men and women who commit adultery shall be punished based on the circumstances to one of the following punishments: lashing, stoning [to death]," article 21 of a draft of the new penal code, reported al jazeera.com
"We are working on the draft of a sharia penal code where the punishment for adultery, if there are four eyewitnesses, is stoning," said Rohullah Qarizada, who is part of the sharia Islamic law committee, which is working on the draft and head of the Afghan Independent Bar Association.
If passed, the law would resemble the 1990s when the Taliban controlled the country. At that time, "convicted adulterers were routinely shot or stoned in executions held mostly on Fridays. Women were not permitted to go out on their own, girls were barred from schools and men were obliged to grow long beards," Reuters reported.
Over the weekend, news reports said that "two lovers narrowly escaped being stoned in Baghlan province north or Kabul, but were publicly shot... instead, officials said," Reuters reported.
"While they were fleeing, suddenly their car crashed and locals arrested them. People wanted to stone them on the spot but some elders disagreed. The next day they decided and shot both of them dead in public. Our findings show that the woman's father had ordered to shoot both man and woman," said Khadija Yaqeen, the provincial head of women's affairs.
The public execution was confirmed by the provincial police chief's spokesman, Reuters reported.
Norway said that it has taken "the rare step of cutting aid on the grounds that Afghanistan had failed to meet commitments to protect women's rights and fight corruption," Reuters also reported.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai said last week that he preferred that his successor will sign the security pact with the U.S., which could keep American troops in the country for a decade or longer,.
"This pact should be signed when the election has already taken place, properly and with dignity," Karzai said
Meanwhile, Susan Rice, President Obama's national security advisor, told Karzai to stop his delay in signing a security agreement or potentially face the complete and final pullout of American troops by the end of 2014, The New York Times reported.
"Ambassador Rice stressed that we have concluded negotiations and that deferring the signature of the agreement until after next year's elections is not viable, as it would not provide the United States and NATO allies the clarity necessary to plan for a potential post-2014 military presence," the White House wrote in a statement.
