In cities and villages across Afghanistan, men with no formal legal training but with membership in the Taliban and a rudimentary grasp of 8th-century Islamic jurisprudence wield unprecedented power over the fate of defendants and the resolution of civil disputes.
Under this summary judicial system, most cases are resolved swiftly, often receiving a verdict on the very first appearance before a tribunal. Plaintiffs and defendants make brief presentations, and a judgment is rendered.
Even in the most serious criminal cases, the absence of prosecutors investigating and presenting the facts to a jury or court means that thorough judgments are a rarity.
The Taliban dismantled Afghanistan’s attorney-general office in 2021, deeming it an unnecessary bureaucratic appendage that fostered corruption and inefficiency.
Under the new system, every aspect — from assigning cases to charging and sentencing — must be carried out in the presence of a judge without the involvement of public prosecutors, according to Abdul Malik Haqqani, the Taliban’s deputy chief justice.
“A judge cannot base his decision on a prosecutor’s investigations. This is our Sharia principles,” Haqqani told a local television channel this week.
Farid Hamidi, Afghanistan’s former attorney-general who now lives in the United States, described the dissolution of the attorney-general’s office as a mortal blow to justice in the country.
“A prosecutor’s only job is to help judges have all the facts before issuing a verdict on a case,” Hamidi told VOA. “This is a widely accept principle all over the world, which aims to ensure only justice is served.”
When the Taliban seized power in 2021, they not only dismantled the attorney-general’s office but persecuted former prosecutors who had previously built criminal cases against thousands of Taliban insurgents.
Thousands of prisoners the Taliban set free from jails across Afghanistan in 2021 have sought to carry out reprisals against prosecutors and judges resulting in the killings of more than a dozen former prosecutors, the U.N. human rights body reported in January.
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https://www.voanews.com/a/taliban-undertake-speedy-overhaul-afghanistan-justice-system/7289101.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judiciary_of_Afghanistan
https://x.com/ProsecutAfghan/status/1706930000530936299?s=20
https://x.com/SReports2/status/1705262536566673520?s=20
https://x.com/SamiullahMahdi/status/1703805700827238910?s=20
https://x.com/ProsecutAfghan/status/1706927358824059165?s=20
https://x.com/ProsecutAfghan/status/1706243033258488039?s=20
https://x.com/ProsecutAfghan/status/1705512529164697642?s=20
Taliban Undertake Speedy Overhaul of Afghanistan’s Justice System
