AFGHANISTAN'S Taleban, notorious for summary public executions, urged the United Nations yesterday to press the Afghan government to stop executing prisoners on death row, citing concern about fair trials.
Afghanistan resumed executions this week after a break of more than a year, with three Taleban sentenced for deadly attacks among nine people put to death.
Those executions followed a public outcry over rising crime.
About 120 other people hav
e been sentenced to death and their fate rests with Hamid Karzai, the president, who has to approve any execution order.
The United Nations and European Union have called on Mr Karzai to halt the executions, citing concern about the standards of judicial fairness.
The United Nations says Afghanistan's law enforcement and judicial systems fall far short of internationally accepted standards.
The Taleban leadership council said it too was worried about fair trials.
"We strongly request the UN, the EU, the Red Cross and human rights groups to earnestly prevent this barbaric act," the Taleban said in a statement on their website, accusing Mr Karzai's government of corruption. The Taleban, fighting to overthrow Mr Karzai's pro-Western government, have executed many captured soldiers and civilians since United States-led forces ousted the militant Islamist movement in 2001.
During their 1996-2001 rule in Afghanistan, the Taleban executed dozens of people, occasionally staging killings in public at Kabul's main sports stadium.
The full article contains 235 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
