International Shia News Agency
Human rights

Spike in violence in Afghanistan threatens media freedom

SHAFAQNA – Reporters Without Borders (RSF) issued a damning statement this Thursday following a series of attack against media workers. It wrote, “RAF has been horrified to learn that at least seven members of Tolo TV’s staff were killed in downtown Kabul late this afternoon when a minibus taking a group of the TV station’s employees to their homes was rammed by a suicide bomber in another vehicle carrying explosives.”

No group has so far claimed responsibility for the attack. The minibus was operated by the Kabura production company, which is owned by the Moby Group.

Journalists are targeted throughout the world but now entire news organizations are threatened by large-scale attacks,” Reporters Without Borders secretary-general Christophe Deloire said.

Jihadists are among press freedom’s worst predators. As in Paris a year ago, killers decided to target a media outlet out of hatred for its editorial policies and hatred for free speech in general. We call on the Afghan authorities to assign all available resources to catching those responsible for this bombing as quickly as possible.”

Tolo TV and 1TV – Afghanistan’s two leading privately-owned TV channels – were named as “military targets” in a Taliban communiqué on 12 October 2015.

Signed by the “Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan’s Military Commission,” it said: “We henceforth regard Tolo TV and 1TVas military targets, not as news media (…) Nothing is safe from our attacks, neither personnel (presenter, reporters or crews) nor the building themselves.”

RSF visited Afghanistan last November to organize a conference on security for journalists and to meet with senior officials – including Head of Government Abdullah Abdullah, information and culture minister AbdulBari Jahani and presidential spokesman Sayed Zafar Hashemi – to ask them to adopt concrete measures to protect the media.

Journalists have paid a high price in Afghanistan since 2001. At least 34, including 15 foreign journalists, have been killed in connection with their work. Most of these murders are still unpunished.

Related posts

Afghanistan: Universities still closed to girls after over 450 days

leila yazdani

Afghanistan: Over 250 schools in Herat ‘unusable’ due to earthquake damage

leila yazdani

Tireless efforts of Afghan women not to surrender to the conditions imposed by Taliban

leila yazdani

Afghanistan: Businesswomen-Traders suffer from absence of Nowruz programs in Balkh Province

leila yazdani

UNICEF: Over 1.4 million girls in Afghanistan deprived of going to school

nasibeh yazdani

Afghanistan: As new academic year begins 1.4 million female students deprived of education

anvari

Leave a Comment