With two Taliban thugs standing behind him brandishing their guns, one Afghan news anchor was nervously urging his viewers not to be “afraid” even though the Afghan government had fallen to the Taliban and the country was now known as the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan.
This bizarre and surreal scene that this anchor went through is just one illustration of the danger that Afghan journalists are now facing under Taliban rule, and it certainly appears that this is going to foreshadow the end of journalistic freedom in that country.
What happened?
Armed Taliban informants stormed into the building of the Afghanistan television network Peace Studio when this anchor was doing a live recording. These Taliban thugs proceeded to hold the anchor hostage even though he was still trying to remain professional and grant favorable coverage to this regime!
“Don’t be afraid,” the anchor reportedly said in a surreal moment during the broadcast.
“With the Taliban militants breathing down his neck, the TV anchor addressed the news bulletin, talking about the collapse of the Ashraf Ghani-led government and the formation of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,” the news outlet reported. “Visibly afraid and uncomfortable, the presenter then went on to tell the nation to not be scared of the Taliban.”
Of course, the video of this scared anchor has gone viral, and this video might very well become symbolic of the terror of the Taliban regime. This surreal video has now been viewed over a million times on social media.
“Afghanistan TV – surreal,” tweeted BBC World News anchor Yalda Hakim along with a video of the incident.
“This is what a political debate now looks like on Afghan TV, Taliban foot soldiers watching over the host,” she added. “The presenter talks about the collapse of the Ghani govt & says the Islamic Emirate says the Afghan people should not be afraid.”
There was a subsequent photo posted on Twitter by Afghanistan journalist Zaki Daryabi that shows at least eight Taliban fighters who had been involved in the storming of this news station.
This is what we can’t accept,” she tweeted in addition to the image. “If so, we will stop our work.”
What else?
But wait, there’s more! Apparently, even though the Taliban has taken over Afghanistan, they are promising a “lenient” government and “amnesty” for those who worked alongside the Western governments and organizations for the past 20 years of U.S. military occupation!
However, just like this anchor learned, the promises of the Taliban are completely empty, and anyone who believes this is totally divorced from reality. In all honesty, what the Taliban is really doing is “hunting down” journalists such as this anchor and persecuting women and religious minorities, including Christians.
These bloodthirsty militants allegedly murdered the relative of an Afghan journalist who had been aligned with a German news outlet called Deutsche Welle just last week. The Taliban also killed a 33-year-old Afghan citizen who had done translation work for U.S. Special Forces and who had worked for a newspaper called Die Zelt.
A publication called Republic World also noted that “the Taliban had barred two women journalists who worked with public broadcasting network Radio Television Afghanistan” and they “attacked two other members of the press for covering the anti-Taliban protests taking place in the eastern Nangarhar province.”
The Taliban is now in charge in Afghanistan, and this is a true dystopia for everyone involved, including this anchor.