The Fallen Journalists in Afghanistan
A Taliban bomber struck a bus carrying journalists from Tolo TV in Kabul, months after the group threatened to target the independent news outlet.
A Taliban suicide bomber struck a van in central Kabul during rush hour Wednesday night, killing seven and wounding dozens of others. The majority of the dead and wounded were members of Tolo TV, an independent television station and one of two outlets the Taliban had previously threatened.
The return of television and music was heralded as one of the triumphs of post-Taliban life in Afghanistan, where entertainment and independent media had previously been banned. Tolo TV, which launched in 2004, has reported critically on such stories as an Afghan court’s recent decision to overturn death sentences for four men who killed a woman outside of a shrine after she had been falsely accused of burning a Koran.
In late September of last year, however, the Taliban seized the city of Kunduz in a surprise offensive. Media coverage of the Taliban’s exploits immediately angered the group, which threatened to “directly eliminate” employees of two media outlets, including Tolo TV.