THE HAGUE – The International Criminal Court prosecutor said Thursday he had requested arrest warrants for two Taliban leaders in Afghanistan, including supreme spiritual leader Haibatullah Akhundzada, accusing them of persecuting women and girls.
A statement issued by Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan’s office said investigators found reasonable grounds to believe that Akhundzada and Abdul Hakim Haqqani, who has served as chief justice since 2021, “bear criminal responsibility for the crime against humanity of persecution based on gender.”
They are “criminally responsible for persecuting Afghan girls and women… and people the Taliban perceived as allies of girls and women,” the statement said.
The manhunt has taken place across Afghanistan since at least August 15, 2021, the day Taliban forces captured the capital Kabul, until today, the prosecutor said.
Since the Islamist group returned to power in 2021, it has clamped down on women’s rights, including limits on education, work and general independence in daily life.
Taliban leaders had no immediate comment on the prosecutor’s statement, which was welcomed by women’s rights groups.
It will now be up to a three-judge ICC panel to decide on the prosecution request, which has no set deadline. These procedures last an average of three months.
It was the first time ICC prosecutors publicly sought injunctions in their investigation into possible war crimes in Afghanistan, which dates back to 2007 and once included alleged crimes committed by the U.S. military there.
Khan said her office was demonstrating its commitment to seeking accountability for gender crimes and that the Taliban’s interpretation of Islamic sharia law could not be a justification for human rights abuses or crimes.
“Afghan women and girls, as well as the LGBTQI+ community, face continued, unconscionable and unprecedented persecution by the Taliban. “Our action indicates that the status quo for women and girls in Afghanistan is not acceptable,” the prosecutor said.
Zalmai Nishat, founder of the UK-based charity Mosaic Afghanistan, said if ICC orders were issued it could have little impact on Akhundzada, who rarely travels outside Afghanistan.
“But in terms of the Taliban’s international reputation, this basically means a complete erosion of their international legitimacy, if they had any,” he said.
Khan’s move came amid an existential crisis at the court, opened in The Hague in 2002 to prosecute people accused of war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide and aggression.
President Donald Trump’s administration is preparing new economic sanctions against him for issuing an arrest warrant against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for alleged crimes in the Gaza Strip.
Moscow counterattacked the ICC for its 2023 order against Russian President Vladimir Putin by issuing its own order against Khan.
Despite the recent spate of high-profile arrest warrants, courtrooms in The Hague are virtually empty and Khan is under investigation for alleged sexual misconduct in the workplace, which he denies.
The ICC has no police force and relies on its 125 member states to make arrests. But several European member states have expressed doubts about Netanyahu’s detention and this week Italy arrested an ICC suspect but did not hand him over.
