As Bad as Life is for Afghan Gays, Expect Much Worse Under the Taliban

With terrifying images coming out of Kabul as American forces leave Afghanistan after 20 years, there are concerns for the fate of the country's LGBTQ+ population as the Taliban takes over the government.

"The Taliban is�expected to enforce�its extreme interpretation of Sharia law across Afghanistan, which would see many women, LGBT+ people persecuted. Under it, queer people and women could be sentenced to death," reported Pink News.

The Taliban ruled the country from 1996 through 2001 "when they introduced or supported punishments based upon their strict interpretation of Sharia law, which included public executions for adulterers and amputations for those guilty of theft, wrote the website New Zealand website Gay Express. While in power, the Taliban banned girls over 10 from attending school, movie theaters were closed, western tv and music banned, women were required to wear burkas and men were required to grow beards.

In the ensuing years, laws making homosexuality punishable by death were repealed; but they are expected to return under the Taliban. Last month a Taliban judge said males found guilty of homosexuality would be, "crushed to death by toppling walls," added Gay Express. "Gul Rahim, a judge in central Afghanistan told German newspaper�Bild�that the Taliban had already begun to implement barbaric laws and punishments in the regions they controlled. Among them, making homosexuality punishable by death – by using walls to crush those found guilty of the offence."

Gay Afghan author Nemat Sadat told Pink News this week that "there is 'no telling' how bad the situation will become for�LGBT+�Afghans stuck in the country under Taliban rule."

Sadat grew up in the United States after leaving Afghanistan as a baby. He returned to his homeland to work as a professor of political science at the American University of Afghanistan (AUAF). "Widespread anti-LGBT+ sentiment meant that it was impossible for him to settle there." Pink News reported. "Warlords spread rumours that he was a practicing homosexual. Sadat reacted to the rumours by advocating for LGBT+ rights on campus and in his classroom."

At the time the Taliban spoke out about the gay rumors about the school. "The extremist group wrote a manifesto claiming AUAF had 'become a bastion of�gays�and lesbians' because of Sadat's activism, adding that he should be 'targeted and killed,'" added Pink News.

Sadat left Afghanistan in 2013 and relocated to New York City. "Sadat was told that he would be 'penalised with the death penalty' if he returned to Afghanistan. He was eventually fired by the university."

He said that the Taliban will actively seek out LGBTQ people. "The Taliban will impose a 'bait, kill and dump' policy," Sadat explains. "That is, they will appoint informants to lure gay and bisexual men online and in public spaces and take them to a secluded spot and kill them and dispose of their bodies. I know this because that is what undercover Taliban elements within Afghan government during the Karzai and Ghani era did and those who escaped shared their story with me."

But don't expect public reporting of these executions as in the past. The Taliban, Sadat said, has "gotten savvy about PR and may be inclined to carry out their anti-gay purging without the world watching.

"They want to shift public opinion on their side," he said. "LGBT+ Afghans really don't have any options. They can either await a slow death or a quick one. Whatever little joy they had will evaporate knowing that the Taliban can take their life at any moment."

Despite the elimination of the death penalty, Sadat pointed out that it has been easy for LGBTQ people living in Afghanistan over the past two decades, saying they are forced to live "like zombies in an open-air prison with no rights or equality", fearing persecution from their families and society.

"As bad as life was for LGBT under the regimes of Hamid Karzai and Ashraf Ghani, there is no telling how severe it can get under the Taliban," Sadat said. "It's not hyperbolic to say that the Taliban will do what Nazis did to homosexuals: weed them out and exterminated them from Afghan society."