The Taliban is reportedly getting quite a kick out of former CIA Director David Petraeus’ sex scandal, with one Taliban official bursting into laughter as soon as a reporter mentioned the retired general in an interview earlier this week.
“What a bastard! But all Americans are the same, it’s nothing new,” the Taliban official told Agence France Presse in the interview, which took place in northwest Pakistan.
“It’s quite normal for Americans and Western people to behave like this — they live in free sex societies where nobody cares about this sort of thing, so what do you expect?” added the official, who wanted to remain anonymous.
Gen. John Allen, the top commander in Afghanistan, is currently under investigation for sending potentially inappropriate emails to Tampa socialite Jill Kelley. It was Kelley who, after receiving what she said were harassing emails from an anonymous source that turned out to be Petraeus biographer Paula Broadwell, first involved federal investigators in the case.
According to the AFP report, during their reign from 1996-2001 in Afghanistan, Islamists offered little leeway for adulterers. The Taliban publicly flogged some offenders.
“From a Pashtun point of view, Petraeus should be shot by relatives from his mistress’s family,” the official said, referring to the Taliban’s main ethnic group.
“From a sharia point of view, he should be stoned to death,” the official clarified.
Petraeus resigned his post at the CIA shortly after the FBI probe uncovered his extramarital affair with Broadwell.
Allen has denied wrongdoing.