From 15 August 2021 until today, five years have passed since the Taliban halted the normal lives of ethnic and religious minorities, women and men through their decrees.

The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) says the Taliban’s severe restrictions on women and girls have had profound social and economic consequences and have become one of the main obstacles to expanding international engagement and investment in Afghanistan.

The Afghanistan Media Support Organization (AMSO) says five years of Taliban rule have severely restricted Afghanistan’s media environment, and more than 80 per cent of female journalists have left formal media work.

I was a journalist. I lived through words and used my camera and pen to tell the stories of my people’s pain. But a day came when I became one of those people whose pain I was supposed to write about.