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CNN Live At Daybreak
America's New War: Undercover in Afghanistan
Aired September 24, 2001 - 08:22 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Reporter Saira Shah is the reporter who went under cover. She joins me from London.
It's good to have you with us.
How long did you go under cover?
SAIRA SHAH, "BENEATH THE VEIL": Hi, it's good to be here.
ZAHN: How long did you go under cover?
SHAH: I only went under cover for five days. I was told that it would be dangerous to stay too long. The Taliban have a very, very good network of informants inside the capital, Kabul, and I was staying in a safe house and trying to keep very, very low key. So I was told, get in and get out very quickly.
ZAHN: And we just saw a small part of the conversation you had with one of the Afghan women. How typical is that of the plight of the average Afghan woman?
SHAH: Well, that is really quite typical. What's happened is the Taliban have banned women from most jobs in Kabul, and there are very, very many women who have been widowed in the 20 years of fighting in Afghanistan. There are about 40,000 widows in Kabul, the capital, alone.
And many of these women have no men folk to earn money. So if they're not allowed to work themselves, they have no option except to beg.
ZAHN: And what happens inside their homes when they are away from Taliban authorities?
SHAH: Well, inside the homes, people -- women can take off their veils, and there is a sort of an underground resistance movement. I went with a group called the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan, who are a feminist movement. And they have all sorts of home-based secret schools, because little girls are not allowed to go to school. They have secret clinics, because medical facilities are very poor for women. They run embroidery projects to try and create a little bit of wealth for women.
I even went -- it was organized by this organization, but I even went to a secret beauty parlor, which was in somebody's home. And I was saying why on earth do you think it's important to have a beauty parlor? Because they were being sent to jail if they were caught. And they said, it's just our way of showing that we're not going to compromise, we're not going to change our way of life, even if we have to cover our faces.
ZAHN: And how many women have suffered that fate -- had their faces cut? How many women have gone to jail simply because they got their hair cut by a friend?
SHAH: There are really no statistics to count that. But I should say here, a couple of things really. One is that it's not just women suffering under the Taliban. I think a lot of attention is put onto women. But really, everybody under the Taliban suffers. Men may be conscripted into the Taliban forces. There have been a lot of massacres of other ethnic groups, who are not of the dominant Pashtun ethnic group, by the Taliban. So, really very, very many people suffering, it's not just women.
But the other thing I would like to say is that while I was in Kabul, I met so many people who are so brave and are resisting the Taliban. And I am desperate for them at the moment. I am, you know, begging American police (ph) to be careful with what they do, because the people who are trapped there and don't like the Taliban may well bear the brunt of any action.
ZAHN: And how well aware are those people of the external political climate today?
SHAH: Well, I am outside of Afghanistan now, so I'm just hearing the same reports as everyone else, but the indications are that they are quite aware. There have been mass movements of people trying to escape the cities, because they fear that they are going to be bombed. And of course, the border with Pakistan has been sealed, so very many refugees are actually trapped inside of Afghanistan, even though they are trying to flee, because they think that they are about to be shelled or something terrible will happen to them.
Another thing that's very important to bear in mind is that, of course, America feels the duty to try to sort out now Osama bin Laden and the Taliban, but really this is a very long-term problem for Afghanistan. And if America does the same thing as it did after the Soviet Union withdrew from Afghanistan and thought the problem was over, if America gets rid of the Taliban or even got bin Laden out and then thought that was the end of the problem, I guarantee there will be another Taliban in a few years' time. It really needs a long period of investment and watching Afghanistan. Otherwise, the same conditions will be created all over again.
ZAHN: Saira, we didn't see this this morning, but -- and perhaps one of the more shocking parts of your documentary, you witnessed mass executions. Why were those people killed?
SHAH: Yes, I didn't actually witness the executions myself. We got a picture documenting both executions, which were not mass executions. They were single executions in the football stadium publicly -- people publicly executed in the football stadium. And we also got pictures of massacres. And I did a lot of interviews with witnesses on massacre sites, and the two things are quite separate.
The executions, which take place publicly in the football stadium are, the Taliban would say, part of them implementing Islamic law. In fact, I believe that they are in many ways a way of sort of helping to keep the population quiet and, you know, slightly crush dissent. Because that there are very draconian punishments if people transgress the Taliban's law.
And the massacres we saw were actually massacres of different ethnic groups in an area, which have been on the front line in some little villages, which have been on the front line between the Taliban and the military opposition to the Taliban. And these civilians were caught in the middle. They belonged to an ethnic group the Taliban don't like very much, and from what I saw and heard from those people, they really were treated as less than human by the Taliban.
ZAHN: Saira Shah, thank you so much. "Behind the Veil" probably gives this audience the most complete look they've ever had at what life must be like under Taliban rule -- thank you so much for your insights this morning. We appreciate it.
SHAH: Thank you very much.
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