Amnesty International: Taliban Must End Their Shameful Campaign Against Mahdi Ansary

Photo: Mahdi Ansary FB

Amnesty International, in response to the Taliban’s release of a “forced confession” video of journalist Mahdi Ansary, has called for his immediate and unconditional release.

In a statement published on Saturday evening (October 4), the organization urged the Taliban to “end their shameful campaign of defamation” against Ansary.

Amnesty International emphasized that the Taliban’s judicial system has become a tool for suppressing critics, and anyone who criticizes the group’s policies faces arbitrary arrest, illegal detention, enforced disappearance, and forced confessions. The organization warned that the Taliban are using these methods to silence the voices of journalists, civil society members, and human rights defenders.

According to Amnesty International, the Taliban sentenced Mahdi Ansari in a “show and unfair trial” to 18 months in prison solely for performing his journalistic duties. The organization stressed that no journalist should be imprisoned for doing their professional work and that the Taliban must ensure that until his release, he is held in conditions that meet international standards and has access to medical care, legal counsel, and family visits.

Mahdi Ansari, a journalist with the “Afghan Agency,” was arrested by Taliban intelligence in the Dasht-e-Barchi area of Kabul on October 5 2024 and has been in prison since then. The Taliban sentenced him to one and a half years in prison on charges of “propaganda against the regime.”

Two days ago, a Taliban-affiliated media outlet released a video of his “forced confession,” in which Ansari, under pressure and in unclear circumstances, expresses regret for his journalistic activities.

Earlier, the Afghanistan Journalists Center also described the release of this video as a “clear violation of fair trial principles” and part of a “growing pattern of media repression” in the country. The center said that the Taliban, through arbitrary detentions and unfair trials, are systematically eliminating media freedom and freedom of expression.

Currently, according to reports, at least six journalists in Kabul, Ghazni, and Parwan are being held in Taliban prisons. Since the Taliban’s return to power, the suppression of media and the release of forced confessions have become one of the group’s main tools for controlling public opinion; the recent video of Mahdi Ansari is the latest example of this repressive policy.