The International Criminal Court (ICC) has made public arrest warrants for four senior Taliban figures, including supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada. They are accused of persecuting women and girls in Afghanistan. The Taliban rejected the move, saying Afghanistan does not recognise the court and attaches no weight to its decisions.
In a ruling issued on Monday, ICC judges unsealed the warrants against Akhundzada and Chief Justice Abdul Hakim Haqqani, both issued in July 2025. Warrants for Habibullah Agha and Neda Mohammad Nadeem were also disclosed. All four were issued between July and September 2025.
According to the court, there are reasonable grounds to believe the four bear criminal responsibility for ordering, inducing or encouraging crimes against humanity. The charge falls under Article 7(1)(h) of the Rome Statute, the ICC’s founding treaty.
What Do the ICC Warrants Say?
The allegations against the Taliban officials include persecution on the grounds of gender, serious violations of fundamental rights, and harm inflicted in a systematic and institutional way.
Persecution Based on Gender
The ICC said the persecution targeted girls, women and others who did not conform to the Taliban’s policies on gender, gender identity or its expression. People seen as supporters of girls and women were also targeted on political grounds.
According to the court, these crimes took place from 15 August 2021, when the Taliban took power, until at least 20 January 2025.
Violations of Fundamental Rights
The judges found that the Taliban enforced a policy that led to serious violations of the basic rights and freedoms of the civilian population.
The court noted that although some Taliban rules applied to everyone, girls and women were singled out specifically because of their sex. Through decrees and religious edicts, they were largely denied education and the right to private and family life. Their freedom of movement, expression, thought, conscience and religion was also curtailed.
Other Afghans were targeted too, because certain expressions of their sexual or gender identity were seen as contrary to Taliban policy. The judges also found that people perceived to oppose these policies were treated as political opponents, including those regarded as backers of girls and women.
Systemic and Institutional Harm
In the warrants, the judges said the Rome Statute’s definition of gender is not limited to biological sex. They said it is broader, in line with recent developments in international law.
They added that any assessment of gender persecution must consider the social roles and hierarchies traditionally attached to people because of their sex, commonly described as gender norms or standards. The court also said this kind of persecution covers more than direct violence. It includes systematic, institutional harm, such as imposing discriminatory social values and norms.
The ICC prosecutor applied for the first two warrants on 23 January 2025, and the judges issued them on 8 July the same year. They were initially kept confidential to protect victims and witnesses and the interests of the proceedings, although the court confirmed they existed. The prosecutor said at the time that applications against more senior Taliban leaders would follow.
The Taliban government condemned the warrants. Spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said Afghanistan does not recognise any body calling itself the International Criminal Court and gives no importance to its rulings.
In a statement on X, Mujahid said the leaders of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan had done nothing that would justify their arrest or punishment by any court. He added that the government follows Islamic Sharia and its courts, not intelligence agencies or what he called so-called courts.
The statement also said Afghanistan expects such institutions to avoid exceeding their jurisdiction and responsibilities, in order to protect their own credibility and dignity.
Who Are the Four Taliban Leaders Named in the Warrants?
Hibatullah Akhundzada
Akhundzada became head of the Taliban in 2016. He is believed to be over 70 years old and remains an enigmatic figure to the world and to Afghans alike. Only two photographs of him are easily found online, the best known being a passport-size picture taken in 1990.
Afghan affairs journalist Rahimullah Yusufzai said after his appointment that Akhundzada was not among the 33 members of the movement that began in Kandahar in 1994. He described him as a religious leader with limited battlefield experience, chosen as leader to avoid objections amid factional divisions.
Akhundzada has issued religious rulings in support of Taliban military operations. He also headed the courts under the Taliban government that ruled Afghanistan before 2001.
Abdul Hakim Haqqani
According to the US-based Middle East Institute, Sheikh Abdul Hakim Haqqani has been chief justice of the Taliban’s Supreme Court since October 2021. He is counted among the movement’s founding figures and is considered one of its most influential religious leaders.
He is regarded as a close associate of senior Taliban leaders, including founder Mullah Mohammad Omar and Akhundzada. He also carries significant weight in shaping Taliban religious rulings and policies.
Maulvi Habibullah Agha
Habibullah Agha is a prominent religious scholar who was appointed Taliban education minister on 20 September 2022. Before that, he served as the provincial head of the Taliban’s Ulema Council in Kandahar.
The Middle East Institute says he taught at local madrasas in Pakistan after completing his studies in 1980, and joined the Taliban shortly after the movement was founded in 1994. During the Taliban’s first period in power in the 1990s, he also headed the criminal division of Kandahar’s primary court.
Neda Mohammad Nadeem
Sheikh Neda Mohammad Nadeem is considered a veteran Taliban commander and hardline religious figure. He was appointed Afghanistan’s higher education minister on 16 October 2022.
The Middle East Institute reports that he served as governor of Kabul province from February to October 2022, and as police chief of Nangarhar province from October 2021 to February 2022. He is regarded as close to the Taliban leader and is reported to have long-standing links with al-Qaeda and other foreign jihadist groups.
He currently oversees a madrasa in Kandahar that he founded in 2015. The European Union has already imposed sanctions on him over his alleged role in human rights abuses.
What Impact Will the ICC Arrest Warrants Have?
A total of 124 countries, including the United Kingdom, are parties to the ICC. The United States, Russia, China and Israel are not.
In technical terms, this means that if any of the four men enters an ICC member state, they should be arrested and handed over to the court. Erika Guevara Rosas, senior director at Amnesty International, said the court had recognised persecution of women and girls, of people targeted over gender identity or its expression, and of those seen as their supporters.
She said the ruling’s significance extends well beyond Afghanistan. In her words, a system of gender-based discrimination is an extreme form of male domination, designed to control women’s lives, bodies, voices and futures.
Richard Bennett, the UN special rapporteur on Afghanistan, called it a “highly significant decision”. He said the additional warrants matter, but so does the court’s analysis of gender persecution and its application to Taliban policies and conduct, which he described as exceptionally important.
