A man and a woman in Indonesia’s Aceh province were publicly flogged on Thursday after being convicted of engaging in sex outside marriage and consuming alcohol, offences banned under the region’s Islamic legal code.
Each received 140 lashes, a punishment that local authorities say ranks among the most severe handed down since sharia law was introduced in the province more than two decades ago.
Aceh, located on the northern tip of Sumatra, is the only province in Indonesia permitted to enforce sharia law, following special autonomy granted by the central government in 2001. Under these rules, intimate relations between unmarried couples and alcohol consumption are criminal offences.
The punishment was carried out in a public park in Banda Aceh, where the pair were struck repeatedly on their backs with a rattan cane as dozens of spectators looked on, AFP reported. The woman reportedly collapsed during the ordeal and was later taken away in an ambulance, the outlet said.
Banda Aceh’s sharia police chief, Muhammad Rizal, said the sentence comprised 100 lashes for sexual relations outside marriage and an additional 40 for drinking alcohol.
The couple were among six people punished on the same day for violating the Islamic code. Those also sentenced included a sharia police officer and his female partner, who were accused of being together in a private space. They were each given 23 lashes.
“As promised, we make no exceptions, especially not for our own members. This certainly tarnishes our name,” Mr Rizal was quoted as saying by AFP.
Public caning remains widely practised in Aceh and is used to penalise a range of offences, including gambling, alcohol use, same-sex relations and extramarital sex. The punishments are often carried out in public spaces and routinely draw crowds.
Last year, two men were caned 76 times each after a sharia court found them guilty of sexual relations. At the time, Amnesty International’s regional research director Montse Ferrer said: “This public flogging of two young men under Aceh’s Islamic Criminal Code for consensual sex is a disturbing act of state-sanctioned discrimination and cruelty. This punishment is a horrifying reminder of the institutionalised stigma and abuse faced by LGBTQ+ individuals in Aceh.”
Human rights groups have repeatedly criticised the practice.
