Zahaak was on his way to Parwan Province when Abducted

KABUL - Police on Tuesday found the body of a provincial legislator stoned to death after his kidnapping by unknown armed men in northern Afghanistan over the weekend, a provincial governor said. Jawad Zahaak, chief of the provincial council in the central Bamyan Province, was on his way to neighboring Parwan Province on Saturday when a group of armed men abducted him, Parwan's governor, Basir Salangi, said.
'Today our police forces found his body,' Salangi told the German Press Agency (DPA).

'Zahaak was stoned to death,' he said, adding that abductors dumped his mutilated body in an area in Siagard district. Police had raided a compound in the district where Zahaak was believed to have been kept, but the kidnappers had relocated him before the police arrived, the governor said. Bamyan is one of the most secure provinces of the country, but two main roads linking the central highland to the capital Kabul carry risk of attacks by Taliban and criminal gangs.

Bamyan is one of the six initial regions where Afghan forces are expected to take over security responsibilities from NATO-led forces in July. Salangi blamed Taliban militants for the attack, calling them 'the murderers of the people.' The militant group, which has been behind numerous direct assassinations of senior government officials, politicians and other local influential people, have yet to make any comment on Zahaak's killing. (DPA)