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Four Afghan men have been ordered to report to the country’s Taliban “morality police” and warned for dressing in suits inspired by the celebrated TV show Peaky Blinders.
The men in their twenties posted videos of themselves in their outfits (flat caps, three-piece suits) inspired by the show starring Cillian Murphy, which is loosely based on a real criminal organisation whose influence in Birmingham, UK, grew in the aftermath of the First World War.
A Taliban spokesman, Saiful Islam Khyber, wrote on social media: “They were promoting foreign culture and imitating film actors in Herat,” adding that the friends had undergone a “rehabilitation programme”.
Khyber told the BBC that the costumes were “in conflict with Afghan and Islamic values.”
“The values in the Peaky Blinders series are against Afghan culture,” he said. “The clothing they wore has no Afghan identity at all and does not match our culture. Secondly, their actions were an imitation of actors from a British movie. Our society is Muslim; if we are to follow or imitate someone, we should follow our righteous religious predecessors in good and lawful matters.”
He explained to CBS News that the men were not arrested, “only summoned and advised and released”.
The Taliban seized power in 2021 and govern through their interpretation of Islamic Shariah law.