Indonesia’s Aceh province has again drawn global attention after a man and a woman were publicly caned 140 times each for having sex outside marriage and consuming alcohol under Islamic law.
The Indonesian government has carried out one of the harshest corporal punishments in recent years in Aceh, the country’s only province that enforces Islamic law. On Thursday, January 29, a man and a woman were flogged 140 times each in a public park in Banda Aceh for engaging in sexual relations outside marriage and drinking alcohol, according to an AFP reporter who witnessed the punishment. The flogging attracted dozens of residents, underscoring the deeply conservative nature of the region.
The head of Banda Aceh’s syariah police, Muhammad Rizal, confirmed that each convict received 100 lashes for sex outside marriage and an additional 40 lashes for consuming alcohol. During the punishment, the convicts were struck repeatedly on their backs with a rattan cane, while the woman reportedly fainted and was taken away in an ambulance. Observers noted that the 140 lashes rank among the highest ever imposed since Aceh was granted special autonomy in 2001, which allowed the formal implementation of Islamic law.
The two were part of a group of six people flogged the same day for violating Aceh’s Islamic criminal code, including a syariah police officer and his female partner who were arrested in a private location. This was not the first such punishment in the province. In August 2025, two young men aged 20 and 21 were publicly flogged 76 times each in Banda Aceh after being convicted of consensual same-sex relations. The punishment was carried out on August 26 following a ruling by a panel of judges at the Banda Aceh Sharia Court, which found the men guilty of violating the province’s Islamic Criminal Code that criminalises consensual same-sex acts.