KABUL: Taliban’s Ministry of Information and Culture said the court’s ruling addressing the actions of some media outlets will be made public on Sunday, TOLOnews reported on Friday. According to the ministry’s press office, the issue involves print and digital periodicals that operate abroad and criticize the system.
The Taliban’s Ministry of Information and Culture said that the directive to revoke the licenses of media firms that operate outside of the nation does not apply to TVs and radios.
“They are 10 media outlets and they are very small media. Television networks and radio stations are not among them. They are all digital and print media,” TOLOnews quoted Abdul Haq Hamad, head of publications at the Ministry of Information and Culture as saying.
Blaming the Afghan media organizations for spreading propaganda, the director of Taliban’s ministry of information and culture, Hemad said that the Taliban courts would, in near future prosecute the media outlets operating from abroad, Khaama Press reported.
A trial for media outlets was scheduled by the Ministry of Information and Culture on January 5, however, it was postponed because no media outlet representatives were present.
“A decision has been made regarding these media outlets. It is expected that the court’s decision will be announced in the near future,” Hemad said, adding that “no law allows the executive of media outlets to operate from outside and promote propaganda against the regime,” according to Khaama Press.
This comes at a time when the restrictions on media organizations and news channels operating in Afghanistan face strict restrictions under Taliban rule.
Recently in the early week of December, the Taliban pushed the media outlets in the country to the margin once again, saying that the authorities are planning to formulate a proper direction for the media outlets.
Time and again, several humanitarian organizations have called out the violations against journalists in Afghanistan.
In the wake of the excessive rise in crime against journalists in Afghanistan since the Taliban seized power, the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) stated the human rights violation of at least 200 reporters in its report, earlier in November. (ANI)
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