UN Pressure Unlikely to Change Taliban Approach to Media ‘Threat’
Michael Hughes
February 26, 2023
Even if the UN successfully intervenes to persuade the Taliban to release a Franco-Afghan reporter held captive in Afghanistan for nearly fifty days, it will not change Kabul’s crackdown because the radical movement understands the power of media.
Reporters Without Borders (RSF) called upon the UN to take all measures possible to get the Taliban to release Mortaza Behboudi, an Afghan native of the Hazara ethnic minority, a group long-persecuted by the Pashtun-dominated Taliban. Behboudi was seized within 48 hours upon arrival in Afghanistan while seeking press credentials.
“In a complaint sent on 24 February to Irene Khan, the UN special rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, and to Richard Bennett, the UN special rapporteur on the human rights situation in Afghanistan, RSF asks them to do everything possible to get the Taliban authorities to free Mortaza Behboudi without delay,” RSF said in a press release on Friday.
RSF said the French and Afghan dual national was reportedly arrested on spy allegations, but the Taliban regime has provided little details and never even acknowledged his apprehension until publicly pressed by several media outlets just weeks ago.
Behboudi, 28, began his career as a photojournalist in Afghanistan at the age of 16 before becoming a refugee in France about five years later, AP said. He co-authored an award-winning series, “Through Afghanistan, under the Taliban,” published on Mediapart, which one can only guess raised the radical group’s ire.
The case comes as the latest example of the Taliban’s crackdown on media in Afghanistan. On February 15, a group of armed Taliban stormed the Kabul headquarters of Tamadon TV, beat some personnel, and accused them of being “infidel Hazaras,” for broadcasting news contrary to the Islamic Emirate’s interests. Tolo News TV reporter Mohammad Yaar Majroh’s was arrested and released in early February after being captive for almost a week. Meanwhile, two other Afghan journalists are still in Taliban custody.
Nearly immediately after the fall of Kabul, the Taliban began imposing draconian restrictions on media. Reporters were told not to report on “matters that have not been confirmed by officials” or issues that “could have a negative impact on the public’s attitude,” according to Human Rights Watch.
The Taliban after taking over in mid-August 2021 jailed over thirty journalists within about two months, HRW said. In addition, the Taliban’s intelligence office also summoned and warned reporters that the information they had been relaying in their stories constituted “propaganda” and had to stop immediately.
A DOUBLE-EDGED SWORD
Regardless of what the Taliban try to tell us, these journalists have not violated any religious taboos nor do they engage in anything genuinely “un-Islamic.” These reporters are also not secret agents of foreign powers. The Taliban fear the media because they know it can be effective, especially considering the information disclosed has the inconvenient virtue of being true.
Issues like torture and the repression of women certainly rank higher than media crackdowns, but the world seems to care more about journalists at risk than the suffering of ordinary citizens, which isn’t so surprising given the media controls global information flow.
Hence, if I were a Taliban policymaker, I would recommend not going too far, for this spotlight comes just as the group seek sanctions relief and legitimacy. But the Taliban would quickly reject my advice on strategic grounds, given they employed media like a weapon as insurgents.
For example, there is clear evidence the Taliban’s media strategy proved effective in molding the narrative around the Western occupation of Afghanistan and the Ghani administration as a corrupt puppet regime.
It is hard to exaggerate the benefits derived – from the public love letter to Trump, which laid the path to the Doha deal, to leveraging social media for battlefield momentum. They often rapidly circulated across social media worldwide, clips of any civilian deaths at the hands of coalition and government kinetic activities, only feeding the storyline of the invader killing innocent Afghans.
Many – if not most – of the accusations being true only lent credibility to the Taliban’s allegations, which took the wind out of the fight against the insurgents to a certain extent.
On Twitter alone, the Taliban spokesperson effectively tweeted to the world “triumphant propaganda” the week before Kabul fell.
Washington’s very own inspector general attested to the impact of the insurgents’ sophisticated methods.
“The Taliban executed an effective campaign that isolated – both physically and psychologically – ANDSF forces and undermined their willingness to fight,” the US reconstruction watchdog said in a report in May.
In short, the Taliban realize one of the key ingredients of effective messaging. They benefitted in peddling “propaganda” because it was based on more than a kernel of truth. And, now, of course, it’s the Taliban that fear its amplification.