Afghan government executes 15 prisoners, vows more to come

Oct 9, 2007, 10:28 GMT

Kabul - The Afghan government vowed Tuesday to continue to carry out executions after the first since 2004 were carried out when 15 inmates were executed by firing squad.

The 15 inmates, at least two of whom were believed to have ties with the al-Qaeda and Taliban networks, were shot to death Monday in Kabul's main Pul-e-Charkhi prison, presidential spokesman Humayun Hamidzada said.

'They were executed for the crimes they had committed, such as murder, insurgency, terror, kidnapping, adultery, etc,' Hamidzada said at a press conference while vowing, 'The execution of such people will be a continuous process for those who commit such crimes.'

Among those executed was Reza Khan, the chief operator behind the killing of four journalists - one Afghan and three foreigners - in late 2001 while they were making their way from Jalalabad to Kabul to report on the fall of the Taliban.

The United Nations protested the executions, saying it had been a staunch supporter of the moratorium on capital punishment observed in recent years.

Tom Koenigs, the UN's special representative in Afghanistan, acknowledged the sovereign right of the Afghan people and their government to decide how to carry out their own laws but called for Afghanistan to 'continue working towards attaining the highest human rights standards and ensuring that due process of law and the rights of all citizens are respected.'

'It is my personal view that the death penalty should be abolished worldwide,' Koenigs said.

Hamidzada insisted that 'carrying out capital punishment is the legal right of the Afghan people and government.'

Analysts warned, however, that if the Afghan government continues to use capital punishment, some NATO countries who oppose the death penalty might be reluctant to hand over suspects to local authorities. NATO is commanding troops in the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan.

The death penalty was commonplace during the 1996-2001 regime of the fundamentalist Taliban but until Monday, had only been carried out once since then. Abdullah Shah, who was found guilty of several murders, was executed in April 2004.