Taliban: We Reached an Agreement with the Islamic Republic to Halt the Execution of 200 Afghans

As tensions between the Taliban government and the Islamic Republic of Iran over the Helmand River water rights have increased, the Taliban's Ministry of Foreign Affairs states that dozens of Afghan prisoners sentenced to death in Iran have been saved from execution. According to the Dari section of Voice of America, Zia Ahmad Takal, the deputy spokesperson for this ministry, recently stated in an interview with Afghanistan's national television under Taliban administration that the number of Afghan prisoners sentenced to death in Iran is 200. He added that the Islamic Emirate was able to reach an understanding with Iran to save these 200 Afghans from execution, as the death penalty does not correspond with their crimes. However, Takal did not specify what the fate of the prisoners exempted from execution will be. While the Taliban's Ministry of Foreign Affairs announces the exemption of the death penalty for 200 Afghan prisoners in Iran, Iran ranks second in the world for the number of executions after China. Meanwhile, UN Human Rights Council experts reported about eight days ago that the use of the death penalty by the Taliban in Afghanistan is shocking. On May 4, the Taliban announced that they had sentenced 175 people to qisas (retribution) and 35 others to stoning. Regarding the transfer of Afghan prisoners from Iran to Afghanistan, Takal also mentioned that discussions between the Taliban government and the Iranian government about the transfer of Afghan prisoners are ongoing, with some progress made. According to Takal, since the Taliban regained control of Afghanistan in August 2021, 1,000 Afghans imprisoned in Iran have been transferred to Afghanistan to serve the remainder of their sentences in their home country. Takal added that Afghan citizens have been imprisoned in Iran due to a lack of legal documents and various crimes, but he did not specify the types of crimes or the number of Afghan prisoners in Iran. However, it is reported that most Afghans who go to Iran are imprisoned by the Iranian government for lacking legal documents, drug trafficking, and other crimes. Previously, some local Afghan media reported that among these individuals, former Afghan military personnel are also present, who illegally entered Iran in recent months due to fear of retaliation from the Taliban. Currently, the exact number of Afghan prisoners in Iran is unknown, but it is said that thousands of Afghan citizens are imprisoned in Iranian jails. This comes while the former Afghan government and Iran had signed a prisoner exchange agreement, under which hundreds of Afghan prisoners were transferred from Iran to Afghanistan. In Azar 1399 (December 2020), Bahador Aminian, the then Iranian ambassador in Kabul, told Fazl Ahmad Ma'navi, the Justice Minister of the former Afghan government, that his country was ready to hand over about 20,000 Afghan prisoners to Afghanistan. He stated that among approximately 20,000 Afghan prisoners, the cases of 2,600 of them were completed and ready for transfer to Afghanistan.