A public execution carried out by the Taliban in the eastern province of Khost on Tuesday was conducted by a 13-year-old boy, local sources told Amu, adding that the man executed had been accused of killing members of the child’s family.
According to the sources, Taliban officials first asked the boy whether he wished to pardon the convicted man, identified as Abdul Rahman, son of Zabit. When the boy refused, he was handed a weapon and carried out the execution by firing at the condemned man in Khost’s central stadium.
The Taliban supreme court said earlier that the man executed was Mangal, son of Talah Khan, who had been convicted of killing Abdul Rahman with a Kalashnikov rifle. The court said the case had been reviewed by primary, appeals and high courts before the execution order was approved by the Taliban’s leader.
The court said the convicted man was originally from Sanjak village in Paktia’s Syed Karam district but had been living in the Khost districts of Ali Shir and Terezio.
Human rights organisations have repeatedly criticised the Taliban for what they say is a lack of transparency and due process in the group’s judicial system. Richard Bennett, the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in Afghanistan, condemned Tuesday’s execution as “inhuman, cruel, and contrary to international law,” urging the Taliban to halt public executions and retribution killings.
Figures compiled from Taliban supreme court statements indicate this is the eleventh judicial execution carried out by them in the past four years.
