'They are trying to kill the media but they are doing it slowly', says Afghan photographer
A photographer from Afghanistan says, 'They are trying to kill the media but they are doing it slowly'.
Afghanistan's media will be shut by the Taliban and they are fooling the West by promising to let journalists operate freely, an award-winning Afghan photographer said after leaving Kabul over threats by the group.
Massoud Hossaini, a Pulitzer Prize winner in 2012 was earlier working for Agence France-Presse and is now freelance. He said that Afghanistan’s new rulers were already restricting female journalists in particular.
Currently staying in the Netherlands, on Friday he told to AFP, "It is going to be really, really bad. They are trying to kill the media but they are doing it slowly. When Taliban capture someone, first of all they capture someone and then kill them, and this is now happening to media in general."
At a World Press Photo exhibition in Amsterdam’s Nieuwe Kerk, he said, "The Taliban will completely close down the media, and they will also cut internet completely and probably become another North Korea for this region. Right now they are fooling the international community, they are fooling westerners."
Further he added, "For sure no woman can walk in the street, we see that female journalists go with the microphone, no it’s not possible. But perhaps the greatest damage is the dispersal of much of the vibrant Afghan media world created in the 20 years since the Taliban were ousted in the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks. It means they already killed us."
He also said, "I really want to go back to Afghanistan, my home is there, my memories are there. I fell in love with Afghanistan by photography, and fell in love with photography because of Afghanistan, and I did my best."
