ICC unseals four arrest warrants in the Situation in Afghanistan over persecution on gender grounds

5 October 2026

Pre-Trial Chamber II of the International Criminal Court has unsealed four arrest warrants in what the court calls the Situation in Afghanistan. The warrants, issued between July and September 2025 and kept under seal until now, name Haibatullah Akhundzada, described as the Taliban supreme leader, Abdul Hakim Haqqani, described as chief justice, Habibullah Agha and Neda Mohammad Nadim. The judges found reasonable grounds to believe each of the four is criminally responsible for ordering or encouraging persecution, which article 7(1)(h) of the Rome Statute lists among crimes against humanity. The warrants treat the persecution as being on gender grounds against girls and women, and on political grounds against people seen as their allies. They cover conduct from 15 August 2021 to at least 20 January 2025. The judges held that persecution covers systemic and institutionalised harm, not only direct violence, and that gender is wider than a purely biological idea of sex. Afghanistan has been a State Party to the Rome Statute since February 2003.