| Murder of Hamed Sabouri | |
|---|---|
| Location | Kabul, Afghanistan |
| Date | 5 August 2022 |
Attack type | |
| Victim | Hamed Sabouri, aged 22 |
| Perpetrator | Taliban members (by Sabouri's brother, boyfriend, and NGOs, denied by the Taliban) |
| Motive | Hate against gay men |
On 5 August 2022, a 22-year-old gay man named Hamed Sabouri was kidnapped and murdered in Kabul, Afghanistan, allegedly by members of the Taliban.
First reported by British LGBT news site PinkNews and later by British newspaper The Guardian , controversy ensued due to an image of a man mistakenly identified as Sabouri. The Taliban has denied responsibility in the killing.
LGBTQ people do not have any right nor recognition in Afghanistan. Since the fall of Kabul in August 2021, LGBTQ+ Afghans have faced increased violence, including kidnapping, rape, and murder. [1] [2] Rainbow Railroad (RR), a Canadian LGBTQ+ organization, reported in November 2021 that the Taliban had intensified the persecution of LGBTQ+ people by applying a strict version of Sharia. [3] According to RR, the Taliban had "kill lists", and anonymous emails pretending to be from the NGO had got in touch with Afghans trying to leave Afghanistan because of their sexual orientation, making them exposed and vulnerable. [3]
The Taliban willingness to persecute gay men was noted in an interview by German tabloid newspaper Bild to Taliban judge Gul Rahim in July 2021, before the fall of Kabul. [4] Rahim said during the interview that only two punishments exist for gay people: stoning or standing behind a wall that falls on him. [4]
In August 2024, Supreme Leader Hibatullah Akhundzada enacted a law criminalizing lawatat (male homosexual relations) with a range of punishments which include execution. [5] [6] In January 2025, Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, Karim Ahmad Khan, requested arrest warrants against Taliban leaders Akhundzada and Abdul Hakim Haqqani for their persecution of women, girls, and the LGBTQ community, marking the first time the court has recognized crimes against the LGBTQ community. [7] [8]
In August 2021, immediately following the takeover of the country, it was reported that a gay man who had been chatting with another man under the promise of a way out of Afghanistan, was deceived by two men who raped and beat him. The men subsequently demanded to have the phone number of the victim's father to tell the man about his son's homosexuality. [9]
On 12 October 2022, PinkNews reported that local activists from Afghanistan had told them that Hamad Sabouri, a 22-year-old medical student from Kabul, had been kidnapped, tortured, and murdered by Taliban members in August, who later sent a video depicting the killing of Sabouri to his family. [10] On 14 October, the Washington Blade echoed the news, saying that a source from inside Afghanistan said that Sabouri had been detained at "one of the hundreds of Taliban checkpoints in Kabul", adding that content on Sabouri's cell phone were probable causes for the Taliban to arrest him. [11]
On 18 October 2022, The Guardian published the news in detail, featuring a photo showing a young man who was alleged to be Sabouri. [12] The note included testimonies from Sabouri's brother and boyfriend who confirmed that he had been kidnapped at a checkpoint in Kabul, and said that he had been tortured for three days before being shot multiple times. [13] The Business Insider verified the footage, reporting that the video shows a man resembling Sabouri being shot in the neck and head "at least 12 times." [13]
Days after the kidnapping, family and friends of Sabouri received a video showing Sabouri's torture and murder. [13] His brother, Haseeb, confirmed to The Guardian that they had received the footage and that the whole family had left Afghanistan for Turkey after selling their two properties in Kabul. [14] Haseeb said that "(they) fled from Afghanistan due to threats and murder of Hamed", adding that "the Taliban came to our home every day to harass and threaten us." [14]
Sabouri's boyfriend, identified by media as Bahar, is a member of Behesht Collective, an underground LGBTQ+ organization in Afghanistan. He told The Guardian that Sabouri was "the love of (my) life", and that he had been in hiding since his boyfriend's murder. [14] Bahar added that he had been previously arrested and raped by the Taliban on three occasions between August 2021 and June 2022. He further described Sabouri as a "shy" gay man and a "very kind boy", calling the Taliban "worse than wild animals" for their persecution of gay men. [10] [13]
Bahar also told media that the Taliban had raided his home and told his mother that they were looking for him to arrest him. He stated that he would be killed if arrested again and reported to be "on the run", having escaped arrest twice by bribing police officers and hiding in a garbage truck. [13] [15]
Afghan LGBTQ+ rights activist Nemat Sadat said that Sabouri's killing was the result of inaction from Western governments to help vulnerable Afghans fleeing the Taliban. He also assured that the death of Sabouri is "further proof that the Taliban will not stop until they eradicate all gay people from Afghanistan." [10] [16]
Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said that there was "no truth" in the article published by The Guardian, denying Taliban responsibility in any killing. [17]
In the original publication by The Guardian, a photo showing a young man was included as a picture of Sabouri. The photo was removed 12 hours later, after Safiullah Ahmadi, an Afghan man living in Iran, said that The Guardian had used his image and that he was not gay, adding that he would sue the newspaper. [17]
Ahmadi returned to Afghanistan in March 2023, with his lawyer saying that he has been forced to live in hiding, unable to study or work because he fears that the perception that he is a gay man due to the publication may cause him harm. The lawsuit at the High Court of Justice demanded more than £100,000 in damages. [18] Ben Silverstone, lawyer for the Guardian News & Media (GNM), asked the Court in May 2025 to dismiss the lawsuit, alleging that the article was not defamatory and could not harm Ahmadi's reputation in England and Wales. [18]
On 16 May 2025, Justice Johnson of the High Court of Justice dismissed the defamation claim, agreeing with GNM that the allegation of homosexuality is not defamatory. [19] In his ruling, Johnson said that while being labelled a homosexual was not true in Ahmadi's case, societal progress made it no longer defamatory. [19] Johnson also dismissed the allegation that Ahmadi was at risk under the Afghan Penal Code 2018, stating that a foreign penal code did not apply for court cases in England and Wales, and that Ahmadi's fears for Taliban reprisals were subjective. [19] According to Justice Johnson, a reasonable reader would understand that Ahmadi's image to depict Sabouri was a mistake, given that Ahmadi is not gay, nor a medical student, and that he is alive. [19] [20]