Jakarta, CNN Indonesia —
Two journalists Afghanistan battered from being beaten Taliban after being arrested while covering a demonstration in Kabul on Wednesday (8/9).
A journalist victim of the violence, Nematullah Naqdi, told AFP that he was arrested along with a colleague. At the police station, they were beaten with sticks, snared with electric wires, and whipped.
“One of the Taliban members stepped on my face and hit me in the face with a hard object. They kicked my head. I thought they were going to kill me,” Naqdi said.
The photographer then told me that at first, he and his fellow journalists from EtilaatRoz, Taqi Daryabi, was assigned to cover women’s demonstrations demanding the right to work and education.
While Naqdi was taking pictures, he was suddenly approached by a member of the Taliban.
“They told me, ‘You can’t record.’ They [Taliban] arrest all those who record and take their cell phones [jurnalis], “he said.
Naqdi’s camera has also become a target for the Taliban. However, Naqdi managed to keep his camera and hand it over to someone in the crowd.
Three members of the Taliban later arrested him on the grounds of participating in planning the demonstration he was covering. He was then taken to the police station and examined in a separate room with Daryabi.
“The Taliban started cursing me, kicking me,” Naqdi said.
At one point, Naqdi ventured to ask the Taliban members the basis of the reason why he was beaten.
The members of the Taliban simply replied, “It’s a good thing you weren’t beheaded.”
After that, Naqdi was taken to a detention cell which was already full. There, he was reunited with Daryabi who was also beaten.
“We were in so much pain that we couldn’t move,” said Daryabi.
A few hours later, the two journalists were released without any information. The two reporters were confused.
“They see us as enemies,” said Daryabi.
The experience of these two journalists contradicts the promise of the Taliban when they returned to power in Afghanistan on August 15. At that time, the Taliban claimed to uphold press freedom.
However, in recent days, dozens of journalists have reportedly been beaten, detained or barred from covering the protests. Most journalists who are victims of violence are local citizens, not foreign media.
A journalist Los Angeles Times, Marcus Yam, also admitted that he had been threatened by the Taliban while covering the action in Kabul.
Yam said a colleague then tried to negotiate with a Taliban leader on the scene until they finally escaped the threat.
“When several people tried to detain me, there was one member who kept interrupting and at one point mumbled, ‘Stranger,'” he wrote on Twitter.
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