Audio excerpt — News Reporter 1:

“Tonight, the Taliban taking Kabul - Afghanistan’s capital and last government stronghold.”

RUBY:

Three years ago the Taliban re-took control of Afghanistan.

Audio excerpt — News Reporter 1:

“Marking the end of a 20 year experiment of democracy.”

Audio excerpt — News Reporter 2:

“Seven Afghans died in a frantic scramble at the Kabul airport.”

Audio excerpt — News Reporter 3:

“We’ve seen them in Humvees with Kalashnikovs, guarding the entrances to buildings, key junctures and roadblocks around the city.”

RUBY:

From his new home in Adelaide, Australia, Muzafar Ali watched warlords returning to the places he loved.

MUZAFAR:

It took less than three months for the Taliban to capture all of Afghanistan. Afghanistan has 34 provinces, one by one it fall like a domino.

So we had restless days and sleepless nights and wet eyes as I saw the Kundi Province where my wife and I got married. It collapsed under the Taliban on the 14th of August.

And then Bamiyan collapsed, the most beautiful place in Afghanistan where my daughter was born. It was so painful to see the Taliban are roaming around in those streets where we spent the best time of our life in Afghanistan.

RUBY:

After the fall of Kabul, western journalists started describing calm on the streets.

Audio excerpt — News Reporter 4:

“There are signs of normalcy creeping back onto the streets. The Taliban announced that government workers…”

MUZAFAR:

The foreign journalists who were stuck in Kabul, that really bothered me. Why our stories are told by someone who has limited knowledge about Afghanistan? It was rubbing salt on our wounds to see that, because the Taliban they don't care about people's life.

RUBY:

Muzafar felt that the reality of life under the Taliban was overlooked. So last month he decided to go back to his home country, at great personal cost.

And what he saw gave him hope: girls and women risking their lives to be educated, teachers defying the Taliban and an Afghanistan never shown to outsiders.

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RUBY:

From Schwartz Media, I’m Ruby Jones. This is 7am.

Today, as we mark the third anniversary of the fall of Kabul, photographer and human rights activist Muzafar Ali shows us his Afghanistan.

It’s Wednesday August 14.

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RUBY:

Well, first of all Muzafar, thank you so much for talking to me today, for coming on the show.

MUZAFAR:

Thank you very much for having me. It's a pleasure to talk to you.

RUBY:

Muzafar, you fled the Taliban more than a decade ago. Can you tell me what life was like at the time and why you decided to leave?

MUZAFAR:

So I am from Uruzgan province, I am a Hazara. I worked in Afghanistan, in the United Nations for seven years as a political analyst.

Honestly, my displacement is involuntary. I was happy in Afghanistan. I got a chance to study in Europe or settle in America. But, several times I refused to leave my country.

From my experience the Taliban, are a terrorist group who don't care about people’s life and the rights of the people.

When I joined the UN in 2005 they hit my car with an IED. My driver slowed down the speed and that's where this huge bang happened, and it got dark. I could see these big pebbles and rocks falling on the car. And I was just stunned and sitting right in the middle of this blast and thinking about myself, am I alive? I looked at the driver. He looked at me, and we were just stunned. And we couldn't say anything and we couldn't believe that we were still alive.

My friends got killed when I was working in the UN. I know Syed Mohamed was one of my friends. He was working with police, and he was beheaded in Uruzgan Province. There are so many examples. How many explosions I saw, how many friends I lost in Afghanistan and in Pakistan, as well as Taliban backed militants. They killed a lot of Hazaras.

RUBY:

So, given that the Taliban had tried to kill you in the past and had targeted your family and that they had killed some of your friends and beheaded one of your friends. How did you weigh all of that up when you were deciding to go back? Were you frightened?

MUZAFAR:

Absolutely. I went to Afghanistan in July after a couple of years thoroughly thinking should I go or not? But I finally got a decision that I will go and I will go prepared, and I will have a purpose in my mind.

I got a permission from my wife. I talked with my daughters because I knew the risk entailed to this trip.

I decided to keep my identity as low and obscure as possible. I stopped using social media six months ago. My digital footprints were limited, everywhere. And I kept this secret just to minimise any possibility of Taliban recognising me and arresting me. I was just another person in Afghanistan, another Hazara in Afghanistan, where I observed quietly what is happening in the streets. But that was definitely a risky trip where Taliban stopped me three times. They interrogated me three times, but I escaped alive.

RUBY:

Why did they stop you and what happened?

MUZAFAR:

So, when I bought my camera from Adelaide, my friend who was a prominent photographer in Afghanistan, he told me “Muzafar you know, you need a licence for your camera if you want to take photo? And you have to go to Taliban's Ministry of Arts and Culture to get that permission”. So, they are scared of camera actually. They don't allow people to take photos in the streets and even if someone is making a video. So if he post this video on the internet, like YouTube or on social media, he will be responsible for consequences because the Taliban don't want any images or any video without their permission. So I was really shocked to hear that.

But I was carrying my camera concealed in my bag and with a hope that I would find some place to take some photos. But then I was stopped in Uruzgan where the Taliban – I was going to a mountain in Uruzgan district where a Taliban stopped me. He said, “what is this?” I was just thinking, maybe he doesn't know what camera is. I said, this is not a camera, this is a binocular. And he was surprised, he said, “what kind of binocular is this? I haven't seen anything like this”. So I had to skip past him and I just left quickly before he would come and see that it's actually a camera, not a binocular.

RUBY:

That’s very fast thinking.

MUZAFAR:

Yeah. And the lesson I learned was that yes, it is really dangerous to carry a camera in Afghanistan.

RUBY:

After the break, illegal schools and graveyard picnics – the ordinary people resisting Taliban rule.

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RUBY:

Muzafar, you returned to your home country with your camera because you wanted to document what western journalists miss about life under the Taliban. So where did you go and who did you speak to?

MUZAFAR:

I will be very careful about the exact locations of my trip, where I went and the real identities of those people that I met.

RUBY:

That’s to protect them?

MUZAFAR:

Just to protect them, to keep them safe. I spent one week in Kabul and that's where I visited several underground schools.

So before Taliban's takeover, these schools were openly providing education. But since Taliban came in the decree that the girls are not allowed to get high school education, so they from outside, they tend to provide primary school education for girls and high school education for boys. But in reality, they also provide high school education for girls as well.

I went to these places to see how the women are feeling under the Taliban regime. So I went to grade seven where there were about 60 students. I was really emotional because this year is my daughter's high school year. She's in her first year of high school in Adelaide. She's in grade seven. And when I saw grade seven students, that was really emotional for me to see that. How lucky my daughter is. She is totally enjoying her freedom as a high school student in Australia, but this is not the case with the girls of Afghanistan. The principal of that school said we are providing education, but our education is considered illegal, quote unquote, “illegal”.

So I remember that the day when I visited, the principal told me that a Taliban have summoned all private school principals in a mosque for an important meeting. So after that meeting, I called this principal. I said, “what was the message from the Taliban?” he told me that the message was that the girls cannot get education in high school, so the principal should obey and follow the decree.

RUBY:

So what is at stake for these girls and their teachers if they don’t follow the decree?

MUZAFAR:

At stake is their life, actually. While I was working in the UN, we were receiving a lot of reports in Uruzgan, in Helmand Province in Kandahar, that they were burning schools, that were killing teachers. Because, traditionally, Taliban are not in favour of girls and women to get education because they think that they should be kept at home and their duties and responsibilities are different from men.

So, yes, at one side, we see the tragic incidents, the risks for the girls education. But I'm more amazed with the resilience of these girls and women that as soon as their school is blown up, they come back. They restart their classes, even if they know that there is no pathway for them to pursue any career or become an independent woman. This message from them is that they are not giving up their hopes and they are refusing to give up their dreams.

Inside they know that this is a basic human right and they continue with this and they fight it. So I really salute these teachers who are doing everything to make sure these girls get education.

RUBY:

What did being in these schools and seeing these girls tell you about how girls and women in Afghanistan are responding to Taliban rule?

MAZAFAR:

Yeah, Taliban have failed. I have seen it in Kabul, in the streets. when the Taliban banned women to come out of their home, at least this Hazara neighbourhood in west of Kabul. Hazara women don't care about this decree. They come out as normal as they can with their beautiful traditional dresses, cloth. They come out, they don't cover their face.

And when I was in Kabul, literally for women, where they were freely allowed to go, was the graveyard. I saw graveyards becoming picnic spots for the women where they would go pretending to be praying there for their loved ones. Of course they did, but they would take some food with them, some snacks with them, and other women would come and talk together. That was literally the only public place where the women were allowed to go.

And some of them have small businesses. I saw one 13 year old girl having an ice cream vendor near Taliban check post. That was a big hope for me. I was just thinking, this is what we need. This is what the civil movements are, the grassroots movements are to defy Taliban. I think we have to focus on those individual heroes as well.

RUBY:

And what do you think the main difference is Muzafar, between the image that we get of Afghanistan from the outside and the place that you saw for yourself when you visited?

MUZAFAR:

There is a huge difference. My approach is that I show normal life of the people of Afghanistan. That is the significant majority of the people of Afghanistan, and they're beautiful. The places are beautiful. Naturally, the news and the media goes towards violence, war, which could attract more attention. And I think we need to pay attention to the aspirations of the people as well.

At the time where the truth is hard to tell, it must tell the truth. And I'm happy that I came back with all my photographs intact, safe. No one saw it. It's with me. Of those schools, of those brave women teachers. They are with me. And, we are here now commemorating the fall of Kabul the third year and I would love to raise voice on behalf of those girls who are not allowed to get education. Those people, the Hazaras who are suffering under the Taliban rule, I have all their photos and I want to be their voice.

RUBY:

Well Muzafar, thank you so much for talking to me about your trip. I really appreciate it.

MUZAFAR:

Thank you very much, Ruby.

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RUBY:

Also in the news today,

Former Prime Minister Scott Morrison has testified at the defamation trial between WA Senator Linda Reynolds and her ex-staffer Brittany Higgins.

Senator Reynolds is suing Ms Higgins over a series of social media posts, which the Senator claims damaged her reputation.

Scott Morrison told the court that the Labor party had “weaponised” Ms Higgins’ rape allegation and that he was forced to remove Senator Reynolds as Defence Minister over mental health concerns.

And,

After a 40-minute delay due to technical errors, billionaire Elon Musk has hosted an interview with former US president Donald Trump on his social media website X.

The live-streamed conversation lasted over two hours, during which the pair discussed Trump’s assassination attempt and Trump praised Elon Musk for laying off Tesla workers.

I'm Ruby Jones, this is 7am, see you tomorrow.

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