Indonesian Couple Publicly Caned for TikTok Kiss in Aceh

A young couple in Indonesia’s conservative Aceh province have been publicly caned after a Sharia court convicted them of violating Islamic law by kissing during a TikTok livestream.

The court ordered the couple, a 22-year-old man and a 25-year-old woman, to be whipped with a rattan cane 21 times each for kissing without being married. At least 100 people witnessed the caning, carried out by a group of people wearing robes and hoods on a stage in Bustanussalatin City Park in Banda Aceh.

The couple were arrested in April after a livestream from 27 February, in which they kissed in a car in Banda Aceh, went viral and prompted reports to local sharia authorities.

Aceh is the only province in Muslim-majority Indonesia that enforces a version of Islamic law. The country’s secular central government granted the province the right to implement religious law in 2006 as part of a peace deal to end a separatist war.

In 2015, Aceh expanded the law to apply to non-Muslims, who account for about 1% of the province’s population.

The law allows up to 100 lashes for morality offences including adultery and gay sex. Caning is also allowed to punish people for gambling and drinking, and for women who wear tight clothes or men who skip Friday prayers.

The couple caned on Thursday were sentenced to 25 lashes each, which was reduced to 21 as they had already spent four months in prison.

The court also seized a mobile phone and a USB flash drive containing the TikTok live video as evidence to be destroyed.

Four other people were also publicly caned on Thursday for online gambling and adultery.

Amnesty International Indonesia said the public caning in Aceh was a form of human rights violation that was cruel, inhumane and degrading to human dignity, carried out despite the fact Indonesia had ratified a convention mandating the abolition of inhumane punishments.

“Such behaviour might be considered inappropriate because social media is viewed by people of various age groups, including children. But is it a crime that warrants imprisonment or even caning? That would be excessive,” said Usman Hamid, the executive director of Amnesty International Indonesia.