The “US embassy Kabul” social media account said that journalists are “under threat and face harassment and physical abuse” in Afghanistan.
“The US recognizes (how) critical a free press is to democracy & supports journalists who are working tirelessly to do their jobs,” the embassy said on Twitter.
This comes as head of the Union of Afghanistan’s Freelance Journalists, Hujatullah Mujadidi, said that threats, violence and lack of access to information are the issues that the journalists are faced with.
He said that more than 130 cases of violence have been registered over the last year.
“We have registered 130 cases of detention, beatings and other cases against journalists,” he said.
“We hope that if the media are not provided with facilities, at least they will be allowed to continue their activities,” said Yar Mohamamd Pardis, a journalist.
But the Islamic Emirate denied the remarks of the US embassy.
“We don’t confirm these remarks because it is against the truth. There are tens of media outlets active in Afghanistan currently. There has been no type of violence in the last year that could cause fatalities to any journalist,” Islamic Emirate’s Spokesman, Zabiullah Mujahid said.
This comes as the Reporters Sans Frontier said in an earlier report that over “43% of Afghan media outlets disappeared. Of the 10,780 people working in Afghan newsrooms (8,290 men and 2,490 women) at the beginning of August, only 4,360 were still working in December (3,950 men and 410 women), or four out of ten journalists.”
