Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Tuesday condemned as "unforgivable" the stoning to death of a young couple by the Taliban which evoked memories of their repressive Islamist regime.
Local authorities said the Taliban killed the man and woman in a remote village in the northeastern province of Kunduz on Sunday for allegedly having an affair.
"President Hamid Karzai condemned the stoning to death of two youths by the Taliban in Kunduz, deeming it unforgivable," his office said.
The statement said the pair "were supposed to get married", adding that Karzai had ordered security officials to bring the culprits to justice.
Local authorities said a 23-year-old woman and 28-year-old man were killed in public because "they had an affair".
Abdul Satar, a resident of Mullah Quli village, said that about 100 people, most of them Taliban insurgents, gathered on Sunday evening as a statement was read out saying the pair had confessed to their affair.
The couple had their hands bound behind their backs and were forced to stand in an empty field as their sentence was carried out, he said.
Human rights group Amnesty International said it was the first stoning it could confirm in Afghanistan since the Taliban were overthrown from power by the US-led invasion in late 2001.
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