Former legislator fatally shot in her Kabul home
Allies pay tribute to parliamentarian who stayed in capital after Afghan government collapsed in 2021.
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Tributes poured in Monday for a former Afghan lawmaker who was shot and killed by gunmen in her home in the capital of Kabul the previous day. Mursal Nabizada was among the few female parliamentarians who stayed in Kabul after the Taliban seized power in August 2021.
The slaying was the first time a lawmaker from the previous administration was killed in the city since the takeover.
Police say one of Nabizada’s bodyguards was also killed in the attack Sunday. Nabizada died on the first floor of her home, which she used as her office.
Karen Decker, the U.S. chargé d’affaires for Afghanistan, tweeted: “Hold the perpetrators accountable!”
“Angered, heartbroken by murder of Mursal Nabizada — a tragic loss. I offer Mursal’s family my condolences and hope to see them receive justice for this senseless act,” Decker also said in her tweet.
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres is “shocked” by the killings of Nabizada and a bodyguard and “calls for a prompt, thorough, and transparent investigation and for the perpetrators to be brought to justice,” U.N. associate spokesperson Stephanie Tremblay said.
Nabizada’s brother was wounded in the attack, according to Khalid Zadran, spokesman for the Kabul police chief in the Taliban administration. A police investigation was underway, he added.
Hannah Neumann, a member of the European Parliament, also tweeted her condolences. “I am sad and angry and want the world to know! She was killed in darkness, but the Taliban build their system of Gender Apartheid in full daylight,” Neumann said.
Earlier, local police chief Hamidullah Khalid said another security guard had fled the scene with money and jewelry. He did not answer questions about possible motives.
Abdullah Abdullah, a top official in Afghanistan’s former Western-backed government, said he was saddened by Nabizada’s death and hoped the perpetrators would be punished. He described her as a “representative and servant of the people.”
Nabizada was elected in 2019 to represent Kabul and stayed in office until the Taliban takeover. She was originally from eastern Nangarhar province. She also worked at a private nongovernmental group, the Institute for Human Resources Development and Research.
After its takeover, the Taliban initially said it would not impose the same harsh rules over society as it did during its first rule of Afghanistan in the late 1990s. But it has progressively imposed more restrictions, particularly on women. It has banned women and girls from schooling beyond the sixth grade, barred them from most jobs and demanded they cover their faces when outside.