When the Taliban assumed control of Afghanistan on the 15th of August, 2021, my heart was filled with grief for two consecutive days. The agony I felt was reminiscent of an incident in 2018 when I narrowly escaped a blast in Kabul that claimed the lives of several of my journalist colleagues. My survival of this horrific blast meant a great deal, but the downfall of Kabul crushed my spirit to an extent I couldn’t have envisaged.
In the midst of despair, I frantically rang my wife, Salma Niazi, to know if she was safe. Her shaky voice indicated the severe crisis when she said, “Everything’s gone awry. People are fleeing.” It was a moment when I felt completely desolate, my heart bursting with sorrow, and life seemed meaningless.
Both Salma and myself were brought up in Afghanistan. Leaving our native land was a thought that never crossed our minds; we had dreams and aspirations woven within the soil and among the people we held dear. But, to our disbelief, we found ourselves among refugees.
There’s a vivid memory of Afghanistan before the Taliban reclaimed power – an era when women enjoyed professional opportunities, children were free to attend school, and there was an air of liberty and opportunities. Both Salma and I, originating from the eastern provinces of Kunar and Laghman, pursued careers in journalism. We were regulars at local cafes, relishing Manto, a signature Afghan dish, with our friends. I took it upon myself to run curriculum-rich online English and journalism classes, widening the scope of education in our knowledge-thirsty nation.
But the return of the Taliban drastically altered our lives. As I witnessed our beloved nation crumbling, my heart shattered. The need to evacuate became unbearable. There were unending phone conversations endeavouring to ensure the safe escape of my family. The attack on Kabul airport made me fear that I had, in fact, doomed my loved ones. However, news of their survival reached me within the hour. I had never felt such profound gratitude in my life.
It’s been a trio of years, with the grief still persisting. August has become a season I dread, loaded with haunting reminiscences. Afghanistan, once a country I yearned to belong to, had lost its essence. A harrowing exodus began at the closure of 2021, a period characterised by four months of domination by the Taliban, leading me to seek refuge in Pakistan. The perilous journey took me eight long days and nights at the Torkham boundary before I penetrated the Peshawar frontier. Salma, on the other hand, was decidedly absent – travel restrictions were unduly placed on women, more severely on the youthful ones.
After experiencing six months of oppressive Taliban-controlled administration, Salma finally came to join me in Pakistan by February of 2022. She labelled the period as a “life in shadows”, one where the mere act of stepping out of her dwelling was denied, trapping her in an enduring state of confinement and dread.
Before everything unfolded, Salma was her family’s lone provider. She functioned as a presenter and correspondent for a local radio station in Laghman. Upon landing in Pakistan, she was unwavering in her resolution to not abandon her comrades, who were left to endure the hardship in Afghanistan. “I’ve witnessed how these defenceless women are left to weep in private,” she disclosed to me. “There’s unfortunately nothing for them to find solace in.”
Our commitment to create the Afghan Times, a platform for Afghan women’s voices, was cemented from within the confined quarters of our hotel room. Equipped with merely a computer and an internet connection, we had the basics needed to lay the foundation. We developed a website and established our presence on several social media channels that soon started featuring narratives from Salma’s acquaintances back in Afghanistan. The costs associated with running the website and social media upkeep were met with our personal savings. The mission of the Afghan Times was to keep us engaged, maintain a link with Afghanistan, and continue to expose the truth.
The state of Afghan media was regrettably gloomy during these times. By the close of 2023, a startling 80% of female journalists had ceased working, over half of recognised media institutions had shut down, and two-thirds of all journalists had abandoned their roles. The Taliban had enacted harsh restrictions on the freedom of press, barring coverage on topics such as civil unrest, human rights, and corruption, while insisting on reporting that painted them in a favourable light only.
The situation took a drastic turn in 2023 when the government of Pakistan declared the expulsion of unregistered Afghan refugees, commencing on the 1st of November, 2023. By April 2024, a substantial number of Afghans had been expelled, reaching almost 746,800 in total. In December 2023, local Pakistani authorities alerted us of our imminent deportation to Afghanistan if we did not leave immediately.
Leaving Pakistan was not a challenge, but it raised the terrifying question of where we could possibly go next. “Are we heading back to the Taliban?”, Salma enquired, her voice trembling with fear. Our request for asylum visa had been recently turned down by the French embassy in Islamabad, casting a shadow over our already bleak future.
In a twist of events, we were thrown a lifeline at the start of 2024 – approval from the Government of Ireland. Landing at Dublin Airport on January 11th, we sensed the first taste of safety and respite since being engulfed by fear from August 2021. The initial days in our new home, nestled in a picturesque corner of Ireland next to the ocean, were spent primarily sleeping, finally liberated from the unshakeable dread that haunted us for years.
I’ve embarked on a journalism training programme at the Dublin Inquirer, followed by an apprenticeship with The Irish Times, all the while contemplating Afghanistan daily where I yearned to one day return to, especially for reporting the plight of women. Meanwhile, from her Dublin base, Salma diligently manages the Afghan Times.
Our narrative however, took an optimistic twist in the midst of uncertainty. Salma and I eagerly await the birth of our first offspring anticipated for October, embodying not only a new phase in our lives but also sparks hope of a conceivable future where we might return to a liberated Afghanistan, bringing up our children in a land which respects truth and liberty.
The past 36 months have spun adventurously. In spite of the Taliban’s stern rules, the gallant journalists of the Afghan Times have courageously broadcast stories about crucial issues. They’ve shed light on the challenges Afghan women encounter under the Taliban’s ruthless governance, which include their ostracisation from the labour force, the growing child labour problem, and the escalation in poverty. In secrecy, our journalists have carried out an estimated thousands of interviews with women, narrating their tales through a series of images and footage. A courageous female journalist back in Afghanistan distilled it as such: “It’s a battle for honesty.”
Journalists at the Afghan Times regard their dual cameras as their “armour in the struggle for honesty”, they continually risk their lives telling stories. They persist in their fight, vowing that no one can prevent us from revealing the true depiction of Afghanistan, and we share this unyielding spirit.