Afghan Woman Journalist Who Made Headlines For Interviewing Taliban Leader Flees Afghanistan

"I left the country because, like millions of people, I fear the Taliban," Arghand told CNN.

ToloNews presenter Beheshta Arghand

New Delhi: An Afghan woman journalist, Behesta Arghand who made headlines after she interviewed a member of the Taliban has fled the country. She was an anchor with the TV news channel TOLO. 

Arghand interviewed a senior Taliban member on August 17, 2021, just days after the Taliban took over Kabul leading to the collapse of the government. During the interview, she asked the Taliban leader about door-to-door searches in Kabul and the group's plans for the future.

Two days later she interviewed Malala Yousafzai, the activist who survived a Taliban assassination attempt, it was the first time Yousafzai was interviewed by an Afghan news channel. 

Arghand spoke to CNN and told them how like other journalists and people her life was in danger, she was quoted in the report as saying, "I left the country because, like millions of people, I fear the Taliban."

Two days after interviewing Yousafzai, Arghand reached out to the activist for help. On Tuesday, she boarded a Qatari Air Force evacuation flight along with several family members.

The 24-year-old Arghand told CNN that she worked at Tolo News for "one month and 20 days, then the Taliban came".

Taliban in its first conference announced that Afghan women will be given freedom and will be able to work under 'Islamic laws' as it vowed to respect women's rights. However, a day after the interview Arghand, the Taliban banned female news anchors in a government news channel and replaced them with their representatives, as reported by New York Times. Khadija Amin, a prominent anchorwoman on state television, informed the Taliban suspended her and other women employees, indefinitely.

Women's rights were severely restricted during the Taliban's rule of Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001. They were banned from studying and working, kept hidden in their homes, and violently assaulted if they were seen in public with their faces uncovered.

The owner of TOLO News, Saad Mohseni said Arghand's case is emblematic of the situation in Afghanistan, reported CNN.

"Almost all our well known reporters and journalists have left," Mohseni said on CNN's Reliable Sources Sunday. "We have been working like crazy to replace them with new people."

We have the twin challenge of getting people out [because they feel unsafe] and keeping the operation going," he added.

Arghand told CNN that she hopes to return: "If the Taliban do what they said -- what they promised -- and the situation becomes better, and I know I am safe and there is no threat for me, I will go back to my country and I will work for my country. For my people."