Afghanistan: Australian journalist Lynne O’ Donnell held by Taliban, forced to tweet apology for her reporting before release

Location: Afghanistan, Kabul 
Date: July 23, 2022

Australian journalist Lynne O’ Donnell was forced to denounce the integrity of her work and apologize for her reporting or face a prison term. Lynne, a columnist at Foreign Policy, was called in for questioning by the General Directorate of Intelligence a day after her arrival in Kabul. Intelligence officers threatened to prevent her from leaving the country unless she submitted to questioning, detained her for hours warned her of a prison sentence unless she tweeted out an apology for "inaccurate" reporting on forced marriages of women and girls to Taliban commanders.

The Coalition For Women In Journalism strongly condemns the harassment and intimidation Lynne was subjected to. Officers responsible for holding her hostage must be held to account. We stand in solidarity with Lynne and call on the Taliban government stop harassing members of the press. 

In July 2021, Lynne reported from Bamiyan province about women and girls fleeing Saighan district to escape forced marriages with Taliban commanders. As Taliban insurgents gained ground they demanded names and ages of girls and women, including widows of those killed fighting alongside the Afghan military,  living in villages they took over, reported Lynne. Militants threatened and beat male relatives as women and girls left their villages to escape sexual slavery and forced marriages. Only some of them were able to return home. Read Lynne's complete report here. 

The journalist landed in Kabul again on July 16, 2022, almost a year after the withdrawal of the United States and Taliban’s takeover of the country. The following day she went to register as a foreign journalist at the Taliban’s Ministry of Foriegn Affairs where ministry spokesperson Abdul Qahar Balkhi refused to grant her registration saying that her 2021 report on Afghan women and girls being forced to marry Taliban fighters was incorrect. Lynne told the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) that Balkhi told her she would be contacted by investigation officers and be required to leave the country.

Over the next three days, Taliban officials and intelligence agents harassed and bullied Lynne, forcing her to come in for questioning while threatening to prevent her from leaving the country. 

On July 19, four intelligence officers visited Lynne at her guest house and took her to the GDI office in Shashdarak area of Kabul. They questioned her for four hours and threatened her with prison time unless she tweeted an apology for her 2021 reports, according to independent broadcaster Afghanistan International. 

In tweets from her personal account, Lynne was forced to denounce her own work and apologize for her reporting. After managing to leave Afghanistan for Pakistan the next day, Lynne recounted on Twitter and in a column for Foreign Policy the ordeal she was put through.

"Tweet an apology or go to jail, said Taliban intelligence. Whatever it takes: They dictated. I tweeted. They didn’t like it. Deleted, edited, re-tweeted. Made video of me saying I wasn't coerced. Re-did that too," tweeted Lynne on July 20, adding that she was out now.

In her column, the journalist recounted harrowing details of how she was forced to discredit her work and apologize for it with  the threat of violence always just around the corner. 

“I left Afghanistan today after three days of cat-and-mouse with Taliban intelligence agents, who detained, abused, and threatened me and forced me to issue a barely literate retraction of reports they said had broken their laws and offended Afghan culture. If I did not, they said, they’d send me to jail. At one point, they surrounded me and demanded I accompany them to prison. Throughout, a man with a gun was never far away.”

Lynne was reporting from Afghanistan when the United States invaded the country in 2001. She has spent several years covering the war and left a day before Kabul fell to the Taliban in August last year. Her reporting has been critical of the insurgency and the US invasion ruffling feathers in powerful corners. Read more about her work here. 

Tweet an apology or go to jail, said #Taliban intelligence. Whatever it takes: They dictated. I tweeted. They didn’t like it. Deleted, edited, re-tweeted. Made video of me saying I wasn't coerced. Re-did that too.#TwoTakesTaliban (I’m out now) #Afghanistan #journalism

— Lynne O'Donnell (@lynnekodonnell) July 20, 2022

“Everywhere I went in the short time I was in Kabul, people told me of their fear, their loss, their disgust, their desperation. Most have no jobs, no money, no hope for their future or the future of their children. What I found was a violent peace. People are arbitrarily detained, disappeared, interrogated, beaten, killed. It could be for any reason or no reason they will ever know. The Taliban are pitting neighbor against neighbor, encouraging people to spy on and report each other. Fear is digging in, and it’s here for the long haul,” wrote Lynne in her recent column. 

The Coalition For Women In Journalism extends support to Lynne O’ Donnell and demands accountability for the threats and harassment she was subjected to by Taliban investigation officers. We call on the Taliban government to hold the responsible officers to account and ensure an end to encroachments on press freedom. Since the Taliban takeover local women journalists around the country have been forced to abandon the profession, with many forced to flee Afghanistan, and foreign journalists have been met with increasing hostilities. Find our detailed coverage on violations against the press in Afghanistan here. The CFWIJ calls on the Taliban to uphold their promises of respecting press freedom and women's rights. Journalists must be allowed to report freely without fear of government retaliation!

The CFWIJ strongly condemns the police brutality against journalists. We demand the immediate return of the press cards seized from the security forces. Policies to intimidate journalists should be abandoned, and journalism should be practiced under the criteria of freedom of the press.

If you have been harassed or abused in any way, and please report the incident by using the following form.