Afghan mother and daughter stoned and shot dead after Taliban accused them of ‘moral deviation and adultery’
Armed men stoned and shot dead a widow and her daughter in Aghanistan after the Taliban accused the women of 'moral deviation and adultery', according to reports.
The killing happened on Thursday in the Khawaja Hakim area of Ghazni city, the BBC reported, and 2 men have now been arrested.
Officials - who blamed the Taliban for the attack - told the Corporation that armed men went into the house where the 2 women lived, took them to the yard outside and they were stoned and then shot.
'Neighbours did not help or inform the authorities on time,' an official told the BBC.
A neighbour of the executed women told M&G.com he heard shots but was afraid to go out.
'When the women in the neighbourhood washed the bodies of the killed women, they saw signs of stoning, and the doctors at the local hospital also confirmed to us,' the man, named only as Rahimullah, said.
However, Ghazni provincial police chief Zilawar Zahid denied the reports that the women were stoned to death.
He told reporters: 'They were killed inside their house.
'An investigation is under way to find out why they were killed and Afghan police have arrested 2 men in connection with the case.'
Officials told the BBC that religious leaders had been issuing fatwas - edicts - asking for reports on anyone who was 'involved in adultery'. Earlier this year horrific video footage emerged of Taliban insurgents stoning a couple to death for alleged adultery in northern Afghanistan.
It took place in the district of Dashte Archi, in Kunduz, and was met with outrage in the West.
However, a Taliban spokesman defended the practice, saying: ‘Anyone who knows about Islam knows that stoning is in the Koran, and that it is Islamic law.
'There are people who call it inhuman - but in doing so they insult the Prophet. They want to bring foreign thinking to this country.'
Source: Daily Mail, November 11, 2011
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