The bodies of three alleged criminals are hung
 from two cranes in a public display in northeast
 Herat, Afghanistan on October 5, 2021.

Taliban hang bodies of dead ‘criminals’ in gruesome public display

By Edward Era Barbacena

The Taliban hung the dead bodies of three alleged criminals in public view in Afghanistan on Tuesday — a shocking display reminiscent of the Islamic militant group’s brutal regime of the late 1990s.

The alleged criminals were killed by a man after they tried to break into his home, deputy governor Mawlawi Shir Ahmad Muhajir told AFP.

Their corpses were hoisted from two cranes in the Obe district in northeast Herat.

The gruesome scene was similar to another public hanging of a dead body in the central square of Herat less than two weeks ago.

In the earlier instance, the person was among four alleged criminals who were killed by police when they tried to kidnap a father and son.

The other three bodies were displayed in other parts of the city.

“The aim of this action is to alert all criminals that they are not safe,” an unidentified Taliban member had told the Associated Press about the September hangings.

The alleged criminals invaded a person’s home,
 according to deputy governor Mawlawi Shir
Ahmad Muhajir.

The Taliban took control of Afghanistan in August two weeks before the US was set to withdraw its troops from the war-torn country.

When the hardline insurgents controlled Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001, they brutally enforced Islamic law by cutting off the hands of thieves and stoning adulterers.

A dead man was hanged by the Taliban in a
 previous instance on September 25, 2021, for
allegedly trying to kidnap a father and son.

Crowds gather to witness a dead man hanged by
 the Taliban at the main square of Herat city in
western Afghanistan on Sept. 25, 2021.