The International Criminal Court’s chief prosecutor announced Thursday that he has requested arrest warrants for the top leader of Afghanistan’s Taliban government and the country’s top judge, citing “unprecedented” persecution of Afghan women and girls. did.
Prosecutor Karim Khan said in a statement that Taliban leader Sheikh Haibatullah Akhundzada and Afghan Supreme Court Chief Justice Abdul Hakim Haqqani had committed a crime against humanity of “gender-based persecution.”
“Afghanistan’s women and girls, and the LGBTQI+ community, face unprecedented and unconscionable continued persecution by the Taliban,” the statement said.
Since the US military withdrew from Afghanistan in 2021 and the Taliban took back power, fundamentalist rulers have promulgated ever-stricter laws of vice and virtue, keeping women out of public life and many private roles. He was completely expelled from the activity.
The edict, presented as an Islamic religious rule, excluded women from work and nearly all public spaces. In 2023, the Taliban shut down all hair salons. The beauty salon was one of the few remaining public places in the country where women could gather outside the home. Afghanistan also bans high school for girls and university education for women, the only country to do so.
A UN rapporteur described this extreme regime as “gender apartheid.”
Many women have fled the country, and some are looking for ways to escape their cramped lives.
The prosecutors’ move marks the first time the Hague-based court has included the plight of LGBTQI+ groups in a discrimination complaint. But this is not the first international legal attempt to pressure the Taliban to loosen its grip on the lives of Afghan women.
Last year, Australia, Canada, Germany and the Netherlands took the Taliban to the UN’s highest court, the International Court of Justice, accusing them of “grave and systematic” violations of a UN treaty that Afghanistan has ratified that bans all acts. . Forms of discrimination against women.
Other countries have since joined the case, which is winding its way through the World Court, where it is expected to hold hearings and potentially result in court orders.
The Taliban has ignored international pressure to change the militants’ treatment of women, but activists hope the group will make concessions as the country’s leaders seek to normalize relations and win international aid. I am doing it. They argue that an international tribunal is important to keep the plight of Afghan women on the agenda.
“Afghanistan’s women and girls finally have the opportunity to secure justice for the atrocities they have endured since the Taliban takeover,” said an independent group working for justice, democratic governance and human rights. said Binaifer Nowrozi, Chairman of the Open Society Foundations. “Without the ICC and other international tribunals, Afghan women and girls would have nowhere else to turn to hold the Taliban accountable.”
Khan’s warrant request is part of a broader investigation into alleged Taliban crimes. Prosecutors said in a brief that their office would seek additional warrants against other Taliban officials for widespread attacks on Afghan civilians.
A three-judge panel issues ICC arrest warrants, a process that can take months. Lawyers familiar with the court said these warrants could be issued sooner because edicts have been openly issued by Taliban rulers that discriminate against Afghan women in violation of international law.
There are no known plans for the Taliban leader to leave the country, so he is unlikely to be executed even if a warrant is issued.
In a statement, Khan said the Taliban insurgency was “brutally suppressed” through “crimes including murder, imprisonment, torture, rape, other forms of sexual violence, enforced disappearances, and other inhumane acts.” He said that it has been done. He compared the repression and violence to crimes committed during the Taliban’s previous years in power.
Ultra-conservative extremists emerged in the aftermath of the withdrawal of invading Soviet troops and captured the capital, Kabul, in 1996. A U.S.-led international military coalition invaded in 2001 to hunt down al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. . This bombing campaign led to the Taliban’s withdrawal.
The ICC investigation into crimes in Afghanistan first began in 2007 but has long been on the back burner. They include accusations of illegal conduct by the US military, including extrajudicial killings and torture.
However, shortly after taking office in 2021, Khan surprised many by announcing that he would “deprioritize” investigations of U.S. military personnel. He said the decision was based on the need to use limited resources efficiently. As a result, the U.S. portion of the investigation was effectively shelved.
