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Ahmad Shah Massoud

Herat – Massoud Day

Everybody is talking about Massoud “Massoud is our hero. He is, of course, Musliman!” – a Herati man Five years ago, just two days before the September 11 incident, the Afghan great leader, Ahmad Shah Massoud, was murdered. It was suicide bombers posing as a journalist and a photographer pretended to interview Massoud and then blasted themselves. Since then, the security officers in Afghanistan became very touchy with cameras. All TV stations in Afghanistan during these days played documentaries about Massoud, mostly made by French filmmakers. It was interesting to see how the image of Massoud among Afghan different ethnics. Massoud was a Tajik, and for the Tajiks he was a great hero. The Uzbeks in a Maimana restaurant in Herat were also enthusiastic when follwing documentary programs about life of the great hero in TV. Some of them even cried exactly on the part when Massoud was murdered and Massoud’s brother was recounting the tragedy. For the Pashtuns, some of them liked [read more]

September 9, 2006 // 0 Comments

Taloqan – The Colorful Mondays

Welcome to Taloqan “First it was the culture, then it mixed with the religion” – Sa’dat The city of Taloqan is the capital of the Takhar province, one of Afghanistan northern provinces. Takhar was part of the Qataghan province which once comprised the nowadays provinces of Kunduz, Takhar and Baghlan. Taloqan is hot in summer although compared to Kunduz, it’s much cooler. The city is dusty, but the smoothly paved road which connected the sleepy provincial capital to Kabul promised its brighter future. The city has somehow a strong link with the Islamic Republic of Iran. Unlike other cities in Afghanistan, the roads in Taloqan has clear name and road signs, and many of the main road signs in the town center are backgrounded with Iranian flag, and signed “Afghanistan and Iran”. Some of the roads have quite Iranian smell, like the “Ayatollah Khomeini” St. Some other main roads are Hafez St., and as in all other cities in Afghanistan, the “Ahmad Shah Massoud” St. [read more]

July 23, 2006 // 0 Comments