The United Nations Human Rights Council on October 6, 2025, adopted a landmark resolution creating an independent mechanism to investigate past and ongoing rights abuses in Afghanistan, Human Rights Watch said today. The resolution puts the Taliban and all others responsible for serious crimes in Afghanistan on notice that evidence is being collected and prepared so they may someday face justice.
The resolution, led by the European Union, was adopted by consensus. The mechanism is expected to include a focus on the Taliban's current abuses against women and girls, which amount to gender persecution. The body will collect and preserve evidence of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and other grave rights abuses; identify individuals responsible; and prepare files that can be used to support their prosecution in national and international courts. The resolution also further extended the mandate of the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in Afghanistan, whose monitoring and reporting remains essential and is complementary to the work of the new mechanism.
"Countries at the UN Human Rights Council have together sent a strong message of their resolve to ensure that those responsible for serious international crimes in Afghanistan now or in the past will one day face justice in court," said Fereshta Abbasi, Afghanistan researcher at Human Rights Watch. "It's crucial for the new mechanism to get up and running quickly so that it can begin to collect, prepare, and preserve evidence, and build files on those responsible for international crimes in Afghanistan."
The resolution responds to calls by Afghan and international human rights groups to address entrenched impunity in Afghanistan. In August 2025, a coalition led by HRD+, a network of Afghan human rights defenders, with support from 108 Afghan and international organizations, reissued an appeal for the investigative mechanism after four years of campaigning. Over the previous year, UN experts and countries from various regions joined civil society groups appealing to the EU to take this step.
The investigative mechanism, in accordance with its mandate and the practice of two similar mechanisms on Syria and Myanmar, is expected to take a comprehensive approach to investigating international crimes. All individuals responsible for carrying out rights-abusive Taliban edicts and policies that violate international law, such as the Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice law, would be subject to investigation, and the evidence will be collected, preserved, and prepared for future prosecutions.
The mechanism is expected to investigate actions by the Taliban leadership, provincial directors, governors, and other officials who are responsible, for example, for torture and other ill-treatment of people in custody. It will also target officials responsible for the denial of women and girls of their rights, notably to education, health care, and freedom of movement, which constitutes gender persecution.
The investigative mechanism's scope is not limited to Taliban abuses but also covers those by officials of the former government, warlords, and members of international forces, non-state armed groups, and others responsible for serious abuses and violations in Afghanistan.
"The European Union has demonstrated principled leadership by putting forward this resolution for an investigative mechanism on Afghanistan," Abbasi said. "By adopting the resolution by consensus, UN Human Rights Council member states have sent a powerful message against double standards for justice or a hierarchy of victims, and demonstrated growing international resolve to bring those responsible for international crimes to account."
The UN secretary-general has been asked to put the body in operation with some urgency, finding a way to ensure that it can begin work on its core mandate despite the UN's ongoing financial crisis. This is particularly urgent for women and girls, whose lives are so restricted every day in many ways under Taliban rule.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued arrest warrants for two senior Taliban officials on charges of the crime against humanity of gender persecution. The resolution directs the new mechanism to cooperate closely with the ICC and, particularly in light of US sanctions imposed on its officials and those seeking justice before the court, condemns "attacks and threats against the Court, elected officials, personnel and those cooperating with the Court."
"UN Human Rights Council members have sent a clear message to victims, their families, and all those bravely fighting for justice in Afghanistan that their voices have been heard, and that their suffering is neither invisible nor erasable," Abbasi said. "The UN secretary-general should ensure the investigative mechanism is promptly rolled out, and UN member states should ensure funding is made available for the mechanism to begin its work."
