By Freshta Ghani
In an announcement published on its website on Saturday, December 10, the director of Jomhor News Agency said that he decided to shut down the Kabul headquarters of the news outlet after being repeatedly summoned and interrogated by the Taliban.
Mohammad Madani, the director of Jomhor News Agency, tells Zan Times that Taliban Intelligence and their directorate of media monitoring have repeatedly accused him and his colleagues of anti-Emirate activities.
He adds: “Taliban intelligence called me on December 5 and said, ‘We want you to mend your ways. If you continue your activities against the Taliban, we can do anything. Our prisons are very big.’”
According to him, the journalists of the Jomhor news have been arrested and beaten twice: once in the summer of 2021 and again two months ago, when their two journalists were arrested and beaten by the Taliban. “Considering these threats, we decided to close the headquarters of this media and lay off our colleagues,” he says.
According to Madani, the news outlet used to have eight journalists in Afghanistan. Though they are now unemployed, Madani says he will continue his own work.
According to information from NAI Supporting Open Media in Afghanistan, the Jomhor News Agency is one of the five media outlets that have stopped operating in the last three months. Zarif Karimi, the head of Nai, tells Zan Times that two radio stations, two television stations, and one online news agency have stopped their activities in the last three months.
At the same time, Karimi says that three media organizations started operating in Afghanistan: two private radio stations in Badghis province named Teaching Quran and Radio Ubur and a radio station in Laghman province called Voice of Shariat. The three new radio stations are all seen as supporting the Taliban regime.
Independent journalists see such new Taliban-led media initiatives as part of their campaign against freedom of speech. They say that the Taliban apply pressure that results in the closure of independent media organizations and then use media affiliates to promote their ideology and narrative.
Zia Bumia, president of the South Asian Free Media Association, explains to Zan Times that the Taliban’s moves in creating new media outlets is to implement their rules and promote their values.
According to the data of the Reporters Without Borders, at least 219 print, video and audio media have ceased to operate in Afghanistan in the past year, 60 percent of journalists have lost their jobs.
Even big international media organizations are affected. Voice of America announced that its radio broadcasts are now banned inside Afghanistan by order of the Taliban. According to the Voice of America (VOA) website, the order, which applies to the radio broadcasts of VOA’s Afghan service and Azadi Radio (an extension of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty) took effect as of December 1, 2022. It applies to FM and MW (medium wave) radio broadcasts from their stations based in Afghanistan
