Focus on the independent media

As the world watched the events of 11 September in horror on their television screens, Afghans missed out on the shocking images that spelt change in their lives. Television was banned under the rule of the ultra-orthodox Sunni Muslim Taliban, but the new Afghan Interim Administration has revived it, also lifting a ban on the independent media. Banning of the media - television, newspapers and radio stations is nothing new in Afghanistan, a country traumatised by conflict, warlordism and, finally, Islamic extremism during the Taliban days. "The state of media is just similar to the state of everything else in Afghanistan, everything needs total reconstruction," Afghan journalist Gul Agha, told IRIN in the capital, Kabul. His comments aptly describe a situation in which the independent media were gagged and even brutalised during the years of war, or under the strict policies of the Taliban, routed in November as the result of a massive military campaign led by the United States, in its fight against terrorism and Osama bin Laden. "There is need for independent media, now more so than in the past. The entire world is focused on us," said Agha, who works for a foreign news organisation. "There has been no free press in Afghanistan for decades now," said Seyyed Salahuddin, a Kabul resident. "Every regime which has come into power was just working for its own interests." International aid workers say this is precisely why the Afghan independent media should be promoted so as to keep a check on future Afghan governments to ensure that the billions of dollars expected to make their way into the war-ravaged country do not become a strong temptation for officials and authorities. "However, the life of a journalist is not easy in Afghanistan. It is extremely dangerous," Eric Davin, a French journalist running a media non-governmental organisation (NGO), AINA, or mirror in the Persian language, told IRIN in Kabul. "Its not going to be easy, but you should remember what has happened to Afghanistan in the last months. Everybody knows around the world that the extraordinary situation in Afghanistan is dangerous to the world," he said, adding that the development of the media was a critical component of the reconstruction process. "We ignored that for years, and it led to a situation. Now we know that. I think developing freedom of expression is crucial, because it is a way of fighting against terrorism and extremism," said Davin, who, with the help of UNESCO and other NGOs, has helped bring back the Kabul Weekly newspaper after a gap of five years. Kabul Weekly's new editor, Fahim Dashty, is no stranger to violence. He was present in the room when Ahmad Shah Mas'ud, commander of the Northern Alliance battling the Taliban, was assassinated in a bomb explosion. Dashty survived the 9 September blast and resolved to restart the Kabul Weekly, which was banned in 1996, the year the Taliban took control of the capital. Dashty told IRIN in Kabul on the day the weekly was relaunched with 2,500 copies distributed across the city that he knows his job is full of perils. "We can be killed easily as compared to a foreign journalist, and also the reaction to that murder will not be as loud as others," he said, but vowed to do his job as professionally as he could. "Without doubt, yes," he replied when asked if he was committed to the independence of journalism in the country. Davin agrees with Dashty's assertion that local Afghan journalists are under greater threat than foreign correspondents working for large networks. "I think in the medium term, local Afghan journalists are under more threat. I think the terrorists will be more cautious in striking at foreign journalists. We know this can be a bit tricky and there can be troubles, but we hope for the best. It has always been dangerous to tell the truth," Davin added. But telling the truth is extremely important, and that is why many Afghan journalists are willing to return home, provided the overall security situation is guaranteed and there are jobs for them. In addition to the Afghan Islamic Press news agency, there are more than 30 Afghan dailies and other periodicals published in the Pakistani North West Frontier Province's (NWFP)capital of Peshawar, catering for the huge Afghan expatriate population in the city. The publications cater for a wide variety of tastes, such as news, analysis, education, literature, history and women in their daily, weekly, fortnightly, monthly and quarterly publications. Most Afghan periodicals appear in both Pashto and Dari. "The need for an open press environment is very strong. Independent press is always important; as we say, it is the cornerstone of a democracy," Martin Hadlow, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) representative in Kabul, told IRIN. UNESCO was instrumental, along with NGOs, in helping Dashty publish the weekly after the presses had been silent for so long. Hadlow said UNESCO, in collaboration with other NGOs, had set up a Media Resource Centre, where journalists, particularly broadcast journalists, would be able to get training. UNESCO has also made a worldwide appeal for books on journalism, even used ones, to put in the library of the resource centre and to donate to Kabul University for its department of journalism. "We are also collaborating with Radio Afghanistan. We have provided funds to the Asia Pacific Institute for Broadcasting Development, based in Kuala Lampur, Malaysia... We have provided funds to them - US $35,000 initially - to be able to start giving some training courses, and also to send people down there and also some of their trainers to come up here," Hadlow said. "Short and long term trainings are needed in coaching the Afghan journalists to be objective and shed the propaganda tendencies that they have adopted over time," Haji Seyyed Daud, the director of the Afghan Media Resource Centre (AMRC), a Peshawar-based Afghan NGO working on media development, told IRIN in Peshawar. Daud felt that Afghan journalists should focus on humanitarian issues, such as mine clearance and drug control, shifting attention away from politics, and called for the restoration of laws dating back to the 1960s that promote media independence, and for a wider private-sector role in promoting the electronic media. Davin said AINA was planning to train up to 150 Afghan journalists each semester in the coming months, imparting not just theory, but hands-on practical training - an ambitious though achievable target. "The establishment of the new interim government in Kabul is a go-ahead signal for Afghan journalists," Daud observed. "We now have educated people in the cabinet. If they can adopt the right policies, we will have a lot of improvement in one year," he stressed.