KABUL, AFGHANISTAN – The Taliban have publicly flogged a man and a woman on charges of “moral corruption” in Afghanistan’s southeastern Ghazni province, the group’s supreme court has announced.
In a statement, the court said the punishment was carried out in Ghazni’s Dih Yak district on Wednesday, March 19, with each receiving 35 lashes and a two-year prison sentence.
The Taliban court added that the flogging took place in public, in the presence of local authorities and a crowd, after approval from the primary court in the district.
The incident is the latest in a series of public punishments since the Taliban returned to power in 2021. In February alone, at least 83 people—18 of them women—were publicly flogged across Afghanistan.
In his latest report, Richard Bennett, the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Afghanistan, documented at least 311 cases of corporal punishment, including 47 women, in the second half of 2024. He noted that this marked a 22% increase compared to the first half of the year.
Human rights organisations, the United Nations, and activists have strongly condemned the practice, calling it a violation of fundamental human rights and a means of instilling fear among the Afghan population.
The Taliban, however, defend their actions as the enforcement of Sharia law, accusing critics of misinterpreting or opposing Islam.
