Sunday, February 15, 2009
iPhones and the Taliban:
iPhones and the Taliban:
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| Mullah Zaif, the former Taliban ambassador to Pakistan, says he is 'addicted' to his iPhone |
I could not believe my eyes. We had arrived to interview Mullah Zaif, the Taliban's former ambassador to Pakistan who is now under virtual house-arrest on the outskirts of Kabul, when he walked into the room, sat down on the couch and pulled out an iPhone.
A former member of the Taliban! An iPhone! How times have changed.
During Taliban rule, which ended when the US and its allies rolled in and took control of Kabul in 2001, the leadership had banned just about anything associated with modern technology.
There were no televisions, no computers, no radios, no music and though iPhones were not around back then, they most certainly would not have been allowed.
I asked Zaif about his gadget. His response was pretty much the same as everyone who owns an iPhone.
"I'm addicted," he said, "the internet is great on this, very fast."
He proceeded to show myself and our film crew his favourite websites. I half expected him to log on and show us 'Taliban Twitter'.
But there is a very serious side to all of this of course.
The Taliban and other groups opposed to US military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq have been incredibly quick to latch on to new technology and methods of communication.
It has enabled them to wage their war in a sophisticated fashion, using not just guns and bombs, but messages and propaganda too.
When reporting from Afghanistan I am always amazed at how quickly we get information from all sides of the conflict with vastly different accounts of what happened.
It is fair to say that no single version is the truth, and that is why we always try to report what every side is saying.
