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ICC Unseals Warrants for 4 Taliban Leaders on Gender Persecution Charges
Confirmed
In Short: The International Criminal Court unsealed arrest warrants for four senior Taliban leaders accused of gender persecution against women and girls in Afghanistan.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) on Monday unsealed arrest warrants for four senior Taliban leaders, including Habibullah Agha, minister of education, and Neda Mohammad Nadeem, minister of higher education, who were accused of committing crimes against humanity through Taliban government restrictions on women and girls.
The warrants, issued in September 2025, were unsealed after the ICC concluded that doing so would not unduly affect ongoing investigations and could prevent the commission of further crimes by the suspects.
The ICC's Pre-Trial Chamber II said the publication of the warrants could also promote cooperation by the international community in relation to the situation in Afghanistan.
The court accused the four suspects of persecution on gender grounds against girls, women, and other persons nonconforming with the Taliban’s policy on gender, gender identity, or expression.
The Taliban’s Supreme Leader Haibatullah Akhundzada and Supreme Court President Abdul Hakim Haqqani were also named in the warrants, which were issued in July 2025.
The ICC said there were reasonable grounds to believe the suspects committed the crime against humanity of persecution on gender grounds, including deprivation of fundamental rights, imprisonment, torture, rape, and enforced disappearance.
The Taliban government, however, does not recognize the ICC and stated that it is bound by the rulings of Islamic Sharia and its courts.
The UN Human Rights Council also urged the Taliban authorities to repeal their policies that have barred girls aged over 12 from school and excluded women from higher education since the Taliban's return to power in August 2021.
Rights groups applauded the issuance of the sealed warrants for the two senior Taliban leaders last year.
However, with the Taliban in control of Afghanistan and the ICC having no police force to execute warrants, the prospect of any of the suspects being arrested remains remote.
What this adds
The full details of the unsealed warrants were not immediately released, and the Taliban did not provide an official reaction to the court’s announcement.
What's confirmed
- The warrants, for Habibullah Agha, minister of education, and Neda Mohammad Nadeem, minister of higher education, were issued on September 9, 2025 and remained under seal until Monday.
- "We are bound by the rulings of Islamic Sharia and its courts, not by intelligence entities or so-called courts," chief spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said in a statement.
- THE HAGUE: The International Criminal Court said on Monday it would unseal arrest warrants against four senior Taliban leaders, accusing them of the crime against humanity of gender persecution against women and girls in Afghanistan since the Taliban seized power in 2021.
- The court said in a statement that warrants were issued in July and September last year for the Taliban’s supreme leader, Hibatullah Akhundzada, and the head of Afghanistan’s Supreme Court, Abdul Hakim Haqqani.
- The existence of the warrants against Akhunzada and Haqqani was revealed last year, but the warrants remained sealed.
- The four suspects are charged with persecution on gender grounds against “girls, women and other persons nonconforming with the Taliban’s policy on gender, gender identity or expression; and on political grounds against persons perceived as ‘allies of girls and women,’” the court said Monday.
- The judges said that the Taliban “specifically targeted girls and women by reason of their gender, depriving them of fundamental rights and freedoms” including education, privacy and family life and the freedoms of movement, expression, thought, conscience and religion.
- “In addition, other persons were targeted because certain expressions of sexuality and/or gender identity were regarded as inconsistent with the Taliban’s policy on gender,” the judges said.
- Rights groups applauded last year when the court issued sealed warrants for the two senior Taliban leaders.
- With the Taliban in control of Afghanistan and the court having no police force to execute warrants, the prospect of any of the suspects being arrested is remote.
- Since they took back control of the country, the Taliban have barred women from jobs, most public spaces and education beyond sixth grade.
- The Associated Press approached the Taliban for a reaction to the court’s announcement.
What's still developing
- The council's 47 member countries unanimously criticised that discrimination "and the harms that it has entrenched, which are unbearable, unjustifiable and should shock the conscience of humanity".
- "Afghanistan calls on such entities not to make claims beyond their authority and jurisdiction."
- A Kempner woman was indicted on multiple felony charges after deputies with the Coryell County Sheriff’s Office said they found 850 grams of THC and lesser quantities of mushrooms, cocaine and fentanyl while serving a search warrant in May.