Afghan policemen get 1 year in jail over mob killing of young woman

Eleven policemen have been convicted and sentenced to one year in jail and eight have been freed over the mob killing of a woman in Kabul. They were accused of dereliction of duty, looking on as the woman was beaten.

Deutsche Welle, 19 May 2015

Eleven Afghan police officers were sentenced to served one year in prison on Tuesday for failing for protect a female student from being killed by a mob in March. The 27-year-old Farkhunda was wrongfully accused of burning a Koran before dozens of people beat her to death in broad daylight in Kabul.

The police were accused of doing nothing to stop the violent crowd.

"You are sentenced...for negligence of duty to one year in prison," Judge Safiullah Mojaddidi said to the defendants, some of whom senior officers, while eight other policemen were freed.

After killing her, the mob set her body alight and threw it in the Kabul River. The March 19 murder was met with shock and anger both in Farkhunda's native Afghanistan and abroad. President Ashraf Ghani described the act as "heinous." EU foreign affairs chief Federica Mogherini said through a spokeswoman that the attack was "a tragic reminder of dangers women face from…the lack of justice in Afghanistan."

A total of 49 people, including the 19 police officers, were arrested over Farkhunda's death, several of whom were seen in a video of her beating that circulating on the Internet, and some others who were discovered bragging about the killing on social media.

Earlier in May, four men were sentenced to death by hanging for their role in the murder. According to Farkhunda's father, his daughter had been arguing with a local man who then accused her of burning the Koran to deflect attention from himself.

es/kms (AFP, Reuters, dpa)