26 Aug 21 | Afghanistan, Opinion, Ruth's blog
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”117302″ img_size=”full” add_caption=”yes”][vc_column_text]Yesterday I met with my local Afghani community. I left in tears. Their stories of heartbreak, of worry for their friends and families and their guilt at being safe in the UK while their loved ones hid in fear was heart-wrenching. Their distress at not being able to get money for food to their family.
These are the people behind the news. The real stories of the impact of the fall of Kabul and the rise of the Taliban. The devastating accounts of people whose lives have changed in a matter of days beyond all recognition. For every person successfully fleeing the Taliban, hundreds are left at their mercy. Women and girls who have been allowed an education and a career for the last two decades. Aid workers who bravely sought to work with global institutions to rebuild their country and a century of conflict. Journalists and activists who strove to make their country better by doing what civil society does – speak truth to power. All now vulnerable because they were brave and wanted to make their country a better place. All now targets of the Taliban.
We have all watched in despair at the news as desperate people have sought assistance to flee the Taliban, a repressive regime that recognises none of the liberal democratic values Index on Censorship was established to promote and defend. A regime that will quash artistic expression, that will destroy artwork, that will treat women and religious minorities as second-class citizens, that will allow no free media, that will seek to not just silence dissent but kill it.
Twenty years ago, in response to one of the worst terror attacks in my lifetime, NATO powers entered Afghanistan to tackle al-Qaida. We made promises to the people of Afghanistan and we offered them hope for a better life. Our actions over the last 18 months, compounded in the last two weeks, show that we have ignored those promises.
There are too many journalists left behind who have deleted their life’s work in the hope that they won’t be targeted. Too many women who were promised a better life, who trained to be doctors and judges and journalists, who will now be in hiding – told to stay at home for their own safety. Too many artists who will leave in fear, who won’t be able to work, to express themselves, to tell their stories. Anybody who is even a little bit different will be a target for Taliban soldiers.
So, what can we do? What should we do? How can we help? Index and many other of its sister human rights organisations have been desperately trying to support people on the ground to get to safety. There are amazing charities who will support Afghani refugees when they get to a safe haven. This is the least we can do. But my fear isn’t today or tomorrow when the world’s media is reporting hourly on events – it’s what happens next week, next month, next year when the world is distracted by a new crisis – a new disaster. What happens to the people left behind then – when the Taliban think the world has moved on?
Index is working with people on the ground, who are determined to stay, who want to both document the actions of the Taliban and try and protect at least an element of free speech. In the coming weeks we’ll report back on this new work programme because we’ll need your help.
But for now, we watch on in horror and heartbreak.
Postscript
As I am writing, reports of terror attacks on Kabul airport and the Baron Hotel started to emerge. My thoughts and prayers are with everyone affected and the brave military and civilian personnel who are doing everything they can, at huge risk, to save as many people as possible.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][three_column_post title=”You may also want to read” category_id=”41669″][/vc_column][/vc_row]
24 Aug 21 | Afghanistan, Europe and Central Asia, News and features
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An Afghan female journalist hosts a radio program at the radio-television channel Ghazal, April 7, 2021.
Mohammad Jan Aria/Xinhua/Alamy Live News
For five days after the fall of Kabul to the Taliban insurgency, Mariam (not her real name) didn’t leave her house. As a professional athlete, this was very unusual. However, 23-year-old Mariam is also one of the city’s up and coming journalists and staying at home did not feel right.
The militant group, known for their regressive ideology and restricting women’s rights and freedoms, had forced many Afghan women to retreat in to the shelter of their homes in the days following the siege. But Mariam had enough. “I wanted to get back to work. I wanted to get out,” she said.
So on Friday, an otherwise normal day off in Kabul, Mariam decided to go to her workplace, a newsroom in the centre of the city. “Around 11.45 am, as I was getting into the car, I got a call from an unknown number. I answered it and the man on the other line, asked, ‘Are you Mariam?’ and I froze in my tracks.”
“He sounded friendly, as though we might have been old friends,” she said.
But something about his voice made her very uncomfortable. Still, she replied, “Yes I am.” He then asked her, “Do you know me?” and she replied, “I don’t and I don’t have your number saved either. Who is this?”
Without answering her question, the man continued, this time in a much less friendly tone. “He identified the location of my office and asked if I worked there. I was so scared, I didn’t reply. He then said, ‘We [the Taliban] are coming for you’ and I immediately hung up and put my phone on airplane mode.”
Mariam is not alone.
In her short career as a journalist and TV presenter, ‘Marzia’ has received many threats from insurgents as well as fundamentalist groups who disapprove of her work in the media. As a woman and as a member of Afghanistan’s persecuted Hazara ethnic group, she was no stranger to threats, but they were always a world away from her vibrant and empowered life in Kabul. Until, that is, the country fell into the hands of the Taliban on 15 August.
‘Fauzia’, another Afghan female journalist, said: “Of course there were challenges of being a journalist in Afghanistan; it was never easy. But I could deal with those because we had platforms, and more importantly, we had the media, to help us fight for our rights.” Fauzia is currently on the run due to the threats she has received.
The Taliban seized control of the majority of the country earlier this month, including the capital. The Afghan president along with many top government officials were forced to flee after being asked to resign on the pretext of creating a transitional government. The militants, however, have taken control of the capital and large parts of the country creating panic and chaos among those who have been outspoken critics of the Taliban.
Since the fall, there has been a rush of Afghans trying to escape the country to avoid persecution from the Taliban who are known to be vengeful. The Journalists in Distress (JID) network, a collaborative effort of media support organisations like the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) and the International Women’s Media Foundation (IWMF) are working in collaboration to evacuate Afghan journalists to safety.
Nadine Hoffman, deputy director of the IWMF said: “The race to evacuate Afghan media workers and their families has been the most challenging and complex emergency the press freedom community has faced. Conditions on the ground, particularly at the Hamid Karzai International Airport, have made this gargantuan task feel at times insurmountable.”
“Those individuals we are supporting to evacuate have faced extreme physical duress; they have been beaten, shot at, and threatened in their homes by the Taliban. It is heartbreaking to watch this tragedy unfold. Women journalists voices in Afghanistan are being silenced.”
In a statement on Monday, the CPJ shared that they had registered and vetted the cases of nearly 400 journalists in need of evacuation, and is reviewing thousands of additional requests. Other organisations have similarly large lists of media persons seeking safe passage out of Kabul.
In a press conference held the day after the fall, Taliban spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid assured that media will remain independent but said the journalists “should not work against national values”. However, despite the group’s assurance of a full amnesty to those who work in media and the previous government, Afghan journalists do not trust the terror group with a history of violence against the Afghan media.
Already, several journalists have reported being threatened by Taliban members across the country. Meanwhile, the CPJ also documented multiple attacks on the press from the Taliban in the last week, including physical attacks. A female state TV anchor was also forced off the air, underlining the Taliban’s lack of commitment to protecting the rights of journalists.
Several at-risk journalists shared that the Taliban had been visiting their homes collecting information on “those who worked with infidels” and warned that action would be taken later, implying this would happen after the complete withdrawal of foreign forces from Afghanistan.
“We knew sooner or later they would come looking for us so we destroyed all our documents, certificates and IDs that show our work with the Americans,” said a journalist from Nangarhar province, ‘Sahar’. “It was the body of my lifetime of achievements, and I set it all on fire,” she added, the grief evident in her voice.
However, it did little good, as the Taliban came to Sahar’s neighbourhood armed with biometrics devices seeking to identify people with data that was shared with the previous government. “They haven’t come to our house yet. I know they will kill me. They have already killed some of my friends,” referring to the journalists assassinated in March in Jalalabad.
Sahar’s fears are not unfounded. Taliban fighters killed the relative of a Deutsche Welle (DW) journalist on Thursday, while looking for him during a similar door-to-door search as described by Sahar. “They shot dead one member of his family and seriously injured another,” DW reported.
Earlier this month, unidentified gunmen shot and killed Toofan Omar, the owner of Paktia Ghag Radio. Officials in Kabul said Omar was targeted by the Taliban due to his work.
Last month, the group killed and mutilated the body of Danish Siddiqui, an Indian journalist working with Reuters, in Spin Boldak in Kandahar province.
Notably, of the total seven journalists killed in Afghanistan this year, four have been women, highlighting the increased risks women in media like Mariam, Fauzia and Sahar face. Already, earlier this year, the Afghan Journalists Safety Committee reported that nearly 20 per cent of Afghan women quit the media due to the threats they faced. The Afghan media watchdog reported that at least nine provinces in the country had no female journalists employed in the media, essentially depriving women’s voices and presence in the national debate.
These figures are feared to have risen considerably in the last week. “Soon there will be no one left to tell the story of Afghanistan,” Fauzia remarked.
After the call Mariam received on Friday, she made a decision she never thought she would ever have to make. Choking back tears, she said. “I decided to leave my homeland; a country I had previously wanted to serve.”
“I went back home, packed a small bag and left for the airport with my sister. We got on the first plane they [offered]. I don’t even know where we are going but I know we can’t live there.”
[All names of journalists in this article have been changed to protect their identities.][/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]
06 Aug 21 | Afghanistan, Belarus, Burma, China, Hong Kong, India, Opinion, Ruth's blog
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”117177″ img_size=”full” add_caption=”yes”][vc_column_text]There are moments as you’re watching the news when it feels as if the world is becoming an increasingly horrible place, that totalitarianism is winning, and that violence is the acceptable norm. It’s all too easy to feel impotent as the horror becomes normalised and we move on from one devastating news cycle to the next.
This week alone, in the midst of the joy and heartbreak of the Olympics, we have seen the attempted forced removal of the Belarusian sprinter Krystina Timanovskaya from Tokyo by Lukashenko’s regime. Behind the headlines, the impact on her family has been obvious – her husband has fled to Ukraine and will seek asylum with Krystina in Poland and there have been reports that even her grandparents have been visited by KGB agents in Belarus.
This served as a stark reminder, if we needed one, that Lukashenko is an authoritarian dictator who will stop at nothing to retain power. And this is happening today – in Europe. Our own former member of staff Andrei Aliaksandrau and his partner Irina have been detained for 206 days; Andrei faces up to 15 years in prison for treason; his alleged “crime” – to pay the fines of the protestors.
In Afghanistan, reports of Taliban incursions are now a regular feature of every news bulletin, with former translators who supported NATO troops being murdered as soon as they are found and media freedom in Taliban-controlled areas now non-existent. Six journalists have been killed this year, targeted by extremists, and reporters are being forced into hiding to survive. As the Voice of America reported last month: “The day the Taliban entered Balkh district, 20 km west of Mazar e Sharif, the capital of Balkh province last month, local radio station Nawbahar shuttered its doors and most of its journalists went into hiding. Within days the station started broadcasting again, but the programming was different. Rather than the regular line-up, Nawbahar was playing Islamist anthems and shows produced by the Taliban.”
Last Sunday, Myanmar’s military leader, Gen Min Aung Hlaing, declared himself Prime Minister and denounced Aung San Suu Kyi as she faces charges of sedition. Since the military coup in February over 930 have been killed by the regime including 75 children and there seems to be no end in sight as the military continue to clamp down on any democratic activity and journalists and activists are forced to flee.
At the beginning of this week Steve Vines, a veteran journalist who had plied his trade in Hong Kong since 1987, fled after warnings that pro-Beijing forces were coming for him. The following day celebrated artist Kacey Wong left Hong Kong for Taiwan after his name appeared in a state-owned newspaper – which Wong viewed as a ‘wanted list’ by the CCP. Over a year since the introduction of the National Security Law in Hong Kong the ramifications are still being felt as dissent is crushed and people arrested for previously democratic acts, including Anthony Wong, a musician who was arrested this week for singing at an election rally in 2018. Dissent must be punished even if it was three years ago.
And then there is Kashmir… On 5 August 2019, Narendra Modi’s government stripped Jammu and Kashmir of its special status for limited autonomy. Since that time residents inside Kashmir have lived under various levels of restrictions. Over 1,000 people are still believed to be in prison, detained since the initial lockdown began, including children. Reportedly 19 civilians have died so far this year caught in clashes between the Indian Army and militants. And on the ground journalists are struggling to report as access to communications fluctuates.
Violence and silence are the recurring themes.
Belarus, Afghanistan, Myanmar, Hong Kong, Kashmir. These are just five places I have chosen to highlight this week. Appallingly, I could have chosen any of more than a dozen.
It would be easy to try and avoid these acts of violence. To turn off the news, to move onto the next article in the paper and push these awful events to the back of our mind. But we have a responsibility to know. To speak up. To stand with the oppressed.
Behind every story, every statistic, there is a person, a family, a friend, who is scared, who is grieving and in so many cases are inspiring us daily as they stand firm against the regimes that seek to silence them. Index stands with them and as ever we shine a spotlight on their stories – so that we can all bear witness.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][three_column_post title=”You may also want to read” category_id=”41669″][/vc_column][/vc_row]
13 Jul 21 | Afghanistan, Media Freedom, News and features
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”117075″ img_size=”full” add_caption=”yes”][vc_column_text]I was on a conference call with my colleague Ajmal Omari a while ago when we were briefly interrupted by what seemed like static. The disruption was no more than the usual challenges of internet connectivity one faces while working in Afghanistan, and we continued our conversation.
After the call, Ajmal texted me to inform me that the “interruptions” were actually a number of BM-1 rockets hitting the neighbourhood of his office. While he and his colleagues survived the attack, there was considerable damage to their building and vehicles parked outside. For Ajmal, a dedicated, talented Afghan reporter and journalist, this was yet another close call.
Despite much progress in the area of free speech and expression, particularly in the years that followed the fall of the Taliban, Afghanistan is a high-risk country for the journalists who work here. The risk is exacerbated for local reporters who face threats not only from the insurgent groups, but also from the strongmen and war lords that have gained power and influence in the country over the last two decades.
The situation has worsened since the US-initiated political settlement in 2019. The eventual deal that the US administration struck with the Taliban in February 2020 saw the start of a new chapter in violence in Afghanistan, one that was more bloody than anything this generation of Afghans had experienced.
Targeted violence, much of it coming from an emboldened Taliban, saw a spike in assassinations of civil activists, government officials and Afghan journalists. According to Human Rights Watch, “Taliban commanders and fighters have engaged in a pattern of threats, intimidation, and violence against members of the media”. At least 11 Afghan journalists were killed in 2020, and five more have been murdered this year, four of them women. Many others, in the meanwhile, have had several “close calls” like the one Ajmal witnessed.
Several journalists who have faced threats are seeking safe spaces in other countries, while those who can’t leave find themselves displaced internally. Over the last year, I have met and interviewed many Afghan journalists who are on the constant move to be able to survive the threats they face in their provinces. The violent threats they face are not only inhuman, but also a major blow to the Afghanistan’s free press.
One such journalist is Habibullah Sarwary, who has worked as a journalist for a decade and half in one of the most dangerous, albeit vibrant, places on Earth. Sarwary, whose name I have changed to protect his identity, is now in exile from his home in southern Afghanistan.
“I have covered everything, from war to development; I have exposed corrupt warlords and documented the rise of insurgency in the country. I have also reported on the more beautiful side of Afghanistan and its culture. But now I am a marked man,” Sarwary told me. While Sarwary is no stranger to threats arising from his profession, the murder of a colleague at the hands of the insurgent group forced him to take the threats more seriously.
Today, Sarwary is a displaced man, seeking to go home to his family. “I can’t return because the Taliban leaders have threaten to kill me if I do. My family has tried to negotiate with them but they won’t let me return,” he said, talking from a safe house where he has been holed up for the past 10 months.
As the violence in the south, and across the country, worsens, Sarwary’s hope of returning home fades further. Aside from the mental stress and physical discomfort he faces, Sarwary is also out of a job. “The south was my turf, it is my home and I am most familiar with its issues. Here I can’t do any useful work or make money to support my family back home,” he said. “I have run out of savings, and am surviving on the kindness of friends,” he added, the sadness evident in his voice.
He hopes the warring parties are able negotiate a political settlement that could reduce the violence. However, he urges the Taliban to allow him to return to his home so he can document the historical changes taking place in Afghanistan. “I should be there right now telling the story of Afghanistan,” he said.
There seems to be next to no hope of improvement in the near future. In the last three months, the withdrawal of US and Nato forces has furthered invigorated the Taliban who have launched increased military attacks on many districts across the country. Afghan journalists are risking their lives to report on these violent developments and often get targeted by warring parties who do not always provide the press the immunity they should.
The situation is worse for women in media, who not only face threats from the insurgent but also from the fundamentalist elements in society who disapprove of them. A recent report by the Afghan Journalist Safety Committee (AJSC) revealed that over 300 women in media—18 per cent of the total number of the country’s female press—quit journalism in a span of six months in 2020, reducing an already small community to the fringes of extinction.
The AJSC report also noted that nine of the 34 provinces in Afghanistan did not have a single female journalist employed by a news service. In a country where many social spaces remain gender-segregated, lack of women’s presence in media essentially means that women’s voices, concerns and issues from these areas are excluded from the national debate and discussions, not very unlike the days of the Taliban regime.
Today, as the Taliban attempts to control more territory and destabilise the rest of the country, Afghan journalists are very concerned over the future of free media in the country—a celebrated gain of the last two decades. Afghan media houses that have flourished since the fall of the Taliban had thrived because of the relatively unregulated media landscape, providing a unique platform for Afghans to vocalise their political, social and cultural diversity.
Their future in the country now remains uncertain, especially in parts where the Taliban already has some control. The insurgent group has never been one to encourage free and inclusive speech, and has often used its military might to suppress vanguards of freedom of expression. In many places, media businesses have already restrained their operations; in other regions they are withdrawing investments. The eventual fall out of this is bound to impact the unbiased, unrestricted flow of critical information. The information blackout will in turn contribute to suppressing civic and social rights of the Afghans.
It has never been more clear than it is now, that increasing attacks on Afghan media are an attempt to trigger an intellectual blackout of an entire generation.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]
