Four men publicly executed in one day in Afghanistan

KABUL

Shows a general view of a football stadium where men were publicly executed in Qala-i-Naw, Badghis province on April 11, 2025.

Four men were publicly executed in Afghanistan on April 11, the Supreme Court said, the highest number of executions to be carried out in one day since the Taliban's return to power.

The executions in three separate provinces brought to 10 the number of men publicly put to death since 2021, according to an AFP tally.

Public executions were common during the Taliban's first rule from 1996 to 2001, with most of them carried out publicly in sports stadiums.

Two men were shot around six or seven times by a male relative of the victims in front of spectators in Qala-i-Naw, the centre of Badghis province, witnesses told an AFP journalist in the city.

"They [the convicted men] were made to sit and turn their backs to us. Relatives from the victims' families stood behind and shot them with a gun," Mohammad Iqbal Rahimyar, a 48-year-old spectator, told AFP.

The men had been "sentenced to retaliatory punishment" for shooting other men, after their cases were "examined very precisely and repeatedly," the Supreme Court said in a statement.

The families of the victims turned down the opportunity to offer the men amnesty, it said.

"If the family of the victim had forgiven the men it would be better, otherwise it's God's order, and should be implemented," a 35-year-old man who gave his name as Zabihullah told AFP outside the stadium.