Young love has no chance

By Sayed Wahed Hashemi

Institute for War & Peace Reporting

HERAT, Afghanistan

Ali Ahmad, 19, and Samira, 18, were walking down a street in Herat in western Afghanistan when a police car drew up in front of them. The police wanted to know the nature of their relationship and why they were together.

The couple explained that they were engaged and due to marry soon. They said they had come together, with the permission of both their families, to discuss their future lives together.

The answers prompted the police to arrest both of them, sending Ali Ahmad to a detention center and Samira to a juvenile reform unit.

Ahmad’s father, Gholam, said his son had wanted to meet his fiancee before their arranged marriage, and this had been their second encounter.

“My son is still imprisoned,” he said. “I don’t know what’s happening with the case or when the court order is going to be issued.”

Mohammad Hassan, the lawyer representing Ahmad, said that the young man had been initially detained on a charge of suspected “fornication.” Conviction could send him to prison for five to 15 years.

Intended fornication

The case of Ahmad and Samira is hardly an isolated one. One local lawyer said that at least 14 cases of intended fornication had been referred to court in Herat over the past four months.

Gen. Sayed Aqa Saqeb, the police chief in Herat, said his officers respected everyone’s rights, but at the same time had to give priority to Islamic law and to prevailing social attitudes.

“Police must have the right to ask anyone to identify themselves and state where they are going,” he said. “We want families to be able to go out freely for sightseeing and picnicking without any harassment, but anything that is against the law and sharia is unacceptable.”

But some are asking whether the police have overstepped their bounds.

Mohammad Alef Erfani, the head of the defense lawyers’ association in Herat, said the police had no basis for detaining the couple just because they were together.

“By law, there is no crime in girls and boys being together, and people can only be arrested if they commit actions that are deemed crimes under the law,” he said. “Arresting such individuals is therefore against the law, and no punishment can legally be imposed.”

Erfani said the issue had already been referred to Afghanistan’s Supreme Court, which ruled in a previous case that, while it was sinful for unrelated men and women to be alone together, if unaccompanied, no legal restrictions could be applied.

Dad Mohammad Wahedi, a university lecturer in Islamic sciences, said the actions by the police reminded him of the days when the Taliban ruled Afghanistan, and women were forbidden to leave home unless accompanied by a male family member.

“We cannot build a wall between men and women as the Taliban government did, when schools and universities were closed to girls,” he said. “We have thousands of male and female students in Afghanistan, who are with one another inside the university and in the classrooms. They’re also able to meet each other outside study time. Should we arrest all of them?”

Police behavior

Human rights organizations were equally critical of the police’s behavior.

Sharifa Shahab, who is in charge of monitoring police activities with the Independent Human Rights Commission’s Herat branch, said personal freedoms were enshrined in the constitution, but this did not stop police harassing couples – even married ones. “It’s an offense to human dignity,” she said.

The recent rash of arrests has many young people in Herat on edge.

“No one is legally allowed to interfere in people’s personal affairs without a judicial order or a legal complaint, or to interrogate people about their relationships,” said Rahmatullah, who is studying law and political science at Herat University.

Sayed Wahed Hashimi is a reporter in Herat, Afghanistan, who writes for The Institute for War & Peace Reporting, a nonprofit organization in London that trains journalists in areas of conflict. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.