(Reuters) - U.S. State Department spokesperson Ned Price said on Friday that Washington condemns in the strongest terms reported comments by a Taliban official who said the group would restore the use of amputations and executions as punishment in Afghanistan.

       Responding to Taliban leader Mullah Nooruddin Turabi's comments to the Associated Press, Price said the acts would constitute gross abuses of human rights.

       (Reporting by Simon Lewis and Humeyra Pamuk; Editing by Chris Reese)