Journalist Safety Committee

I sat in on an interview (not because I was invited but because I didn't gracefully leave the room in time) about a report on attacks on journalists in Afghanistan from a local group that's based itself on CPJ and RSF. Maybe the most interesting thing is that they found only 11% of attacks were by the Taliban. Their explanation is that the Taliban in fact want to retain good relations with journalists and have found that killing journalists works against them. They want publicity, ASJC's officers said. When journalists call Taliban spokespeople they answer on the first ring; journos have to call government ministries repeatedly just to get the official line. After prominent journalist Sardar Ahmad was in the wrong place and the wrong time and gunned down with his wife and children in an attack on the Agha Khan's Serena Hotel in March, a large group of Afghan journalists boycotted any coverage of the Taliban, which ASJC says the Taliban recognized really didn't serve their propaganda interests. When another journalist was killed in a suicide attack a few months later, the Taliban issued a statement of regret.
The government is another story. According to ASJC, big politicians and especially warlords/governors out in the provinces all have their own TV and radio stations and newspapers so they have less need or patience for independent journalists.

The interview was weirdly reassuring actually--there have been fewer and for the most part more predictable attacks on local journalists than I had assumed/thought from reading occasional news.

ASJC is looking for foreign interns, by the way. Spread the word.