Eyewitness to the Taliban
In Kabul, Kiwi journalist Charlotte Bellis faces a lonely vigil. There are two things uppermost in her mind.
The first is her duty to let the world know about an impending humanitarian disaster that could cost millions of Afghan lives.
The withdrawal of Western aid following the takeover of the country by the Taliban has left more than half the population facing starvation. “I think a lot of people think that the story is over, because the West isn’t there any more. But on a humanitarian level, it’s huge,” she stresses.
The second is a potential threat to her own life.
Many Kiwis will associate Bellis with her unforgettable reporting on the evacuation of Kabul for the Al Jazeera tv channel. Gun-toting fighters posed for her at the end of the runway as the last American plane flew into the night.
She briefly returned to Al Jazeera’s home base of Qatar before returning to Kabul. But she hadn’t been there long when her bosses got a warning from the Taliban that the militant Sunni Islamist group Isis was planning an attack on her hotel.
Al Jazeera decided the situation was so dangerous it withdrew all
