Spanish
Jakarta, June 4 (EFE).- A woman received 100 lashes in public this Wednesday after being convicted by an Islamic court in the Indonesian province of Aceh, where sharia has been in force since 2001.
The woman, apparently young, received the lashes from the executioner in front of dozens of people, who kept his face covered the whole time, according to EFE.
The condemned woman asked for the punishment to stop on at least two occasions, during which she was comforted by other women, who gave her some food and drink, before continuing to receive lashes until reaching 100 blows.
In addition to her, four other men received the same number of lashes for other violations of sharia law, which punishes in this way matters such as consensual relationships between people of the same sex, the consumption of alcohol, and coitus outside of marriage.
The woman received the punishment sitting, while the men endured the whippings standing.Aceh is the only province that applies sharia in Indonesia, the nation with the largest Muslim population in the world, which also leads the global rates of female genital mutilation, in some cases linked to beliefs of the Islamic faith.
Public flogging is common in this province, where on February 27th, two young men, aged 18 and 24, were similarly punished with lashes for having had sexual relations with each other, despite the fact that it was a consensual act.
Homosexuality is not illegal under Indonesian law - except in Aceh, where Islamic law is applied - but it is considered a taboo subject in this country where "there is an increasingly hostile environment for the gay community", according to Human Right Watch. EFE
