Og der er fortsat hundreder på dødsgangene i det plagede centralasiatiske land, som den danske regering nu har udnævnt til største modtager af vor udviklingsbistand de kommende år – Amnesty beretter om udbredt tortur i fængslerne.
Six prisoners have been hanged in Afghanistan, bringing to 14 the number of executions in the past two days, officials say, according to BBC online Wednesday.
Executions have been rare since the Taliban fell in 2001. Officials said that those hanged were criminals, not militants linked to the Taliban or al-Qaeda.
All of them had been found guilty of serious offences including rape and “crimes against the people, especially women and children”.
The move is likely to please many Afghans who complain that serious crime is on the rise and argue that the use of the death penalty is a necessary deterrent.
Reports say there have been only two executions in Afghanistan in the past four years.
President Hamid Karzai – who has the power to stop people from being hanged – approved the executions. He may have been under pressure to act, with more than 250 inmates on death row.
A further eight condemned prisoners are due to be put to death soon. Amnesty International Asia-Pacific Deputy Director Polly Truscott said the hangings were “the ultimate form of cruel and inhuman punishment”.
“Detainees are frequently tortured into confessions and relied on by a judiciary (retsvæsen) that has little to no independence… There is simply no guarantee of a fair trial,” she said.
The Taliban are notorious for executing people in public in areas they control for “crimes” including adultery (utroskab).
