Afghan Taliban issue warning to media day after suicide attack
The Afghan Taliban on Thursday issued a warning to the country’s media, a day after a suicide attack in the heart of Kabul killed seven employees of a leading media group.
The Afghan Taliban on Thursday issued a warning to the country’s media not to oppose jihad and Islam, a day after a suicide attack in the heart of Kabul killed seven employees of a leading media group.
The Taliban claimed responsibility for Wednesday’s suicide attack on a bus of Kaboora Production, a sister organisation of Tolo TV, that also injured 26 people.
“We want to reassure all impartial media outlets. They must not unintentionally compare themselves with Tolo and should withhold from making unwarranted assertions...,” the Taliban said in the warning posted on its website.
The statement claimed the Tolo group was targeted because “its workers were anti-Jihad and anti-Islam elements trained by foreign intelligence toiling for the Americans”.
The Taliban had earlier warned Tolo and Kabul-based 1TV channel in October. At that time too, the militants had accused the channels of spreading “propaganda” against jihad and mujahideen.
The Taliban had warned last year that reporters of the two channels would be “deemed enemy personnel” and their offices considered “military objectives which will be directly eliminated”.
After a suicide bomber detonated his explosives near the bus carrying more than 30 staff from Kaboora Production in Kabul on Wednesday evening, Tolo TV condemned the incident as one of a series of “terrorist attacks that kill innocent Afghans”.
President Ashraf Ghani and CEO Abdullah Abdullah too condemned the attack. Abdullah said freedom of speech is a major achievement of Afghanistan in the past 14 years and such attacks would not stop people from speaking out.