Image from AP.
Image from NDTV.
Taliban militants covered their faces before they executed two women on Saturday in Ghazni province, Afghanistan, alleging that they were organizers of a sex ring catering to US soldiers and foreign contractors.
A spokesman for the local governor says that they were "innocent local people." Summary execution without trial.
The pictures above showing the women awaiting their execution and after being killed are horrifying. They haunt me. I'm sorry if any of you find them offensive, but we need to know that the situation in Afghanistan is getting worse, much worse.
This terrible news comes on the heels of the news of the nine US soldiers killed in Afghanistan over the weekend.
The stoning scene in The Kite Runner was gut-wrenching. Our world is full of barbarism - some done on a small scale and some on a large one. But we must not turn away and pretend it is not so. Thank you for speaking truth to both power and denial.
ReplyDeleteAnd all done in the name of God. How do we answer this evil done against our common humanity?
ReplyDeleteI thought long and hard about publishing these pictures. I went to hit "publish" several times and backed away. In the end, I went with them. I had to. Perhaps posting them is an attempt to exorcise my demons.
ReplyDeleteThe hard part is facing REAL...the part that my God insists from me it seems...that's my personal character challenge, my moral dilemma, the LINE drawn in the sand...it's NOT in the running for cover, escaping, avoiding, denying and playing of PRETEND that blatant WRONG becomes Godly RIGHT..justice and truth come in the standing upright with eyes/ears open as my cowardly preferences become brave, yet small and honorable, acts in favor of Gods "will" for all of mankind.
ReplyDeleteLeonardo, the temptation to turn away is great, and sometimes I do, when the cruelty in the world seems overpowering. But I can't stay looking the other way forever.
ReplyDeleteLeonardo is right. I've believed for a long time that one way we answer evil against humanity is to stand and witness and not be silent.
ReplyDeleteMay the Compassionate One have mercy on them. And on us.
Kate, yes, to stand and witness, as little as it is, is the least we can do.
ReplyDeleteIt's shocking to see two human beings - not that you could see much of them - ruthlessly turned into two lifeless heaps beneath blankets. Go ahead. Cover your crime with blankets. The blood still flows.
We do need to know. Who else will speak for these women?
ReplyDeleteYou are right to publish this even though it made me feel nauseous.
ReplyDeleteThis is reality at its worst.
Oh, Mimi, this is awful!
ReplyDeleteThis is indeed truly awful. Thank you for posting it though. It is one of those things where you never know what to do with a terrible piece of information and you want to go and yell it out so that everyone finally pays attention...
ReplyDeleteI have just finished reading Khaled Hosseini's second book 'A thousand splendid suns' (his first one being the aforementioned 'Kite runner'). It is very good and very disturbing at the same time. A definite recommendation. It helped me to relate to the situation of the people in Afghanistan.
Annika, welcome. Thanks for the book recommendation.
ReplyDeleteEach time I look at the pictures, I gasp. It seems sacrilegious to post a joke following the pictures, but when the world seems like a horror movie, in a crazy way, I need a laugh from time to time, just to stay more or less sane,
Awful but absolutely true and in need of getting out there where it can be seen.
ReplyDeleteGod have mercy on us all.
ReplyDeleteThere is nothing left to say.
I have no more words.
ReplyDelete