Key Reflections
* Documentaries have served as primary source information vividly depicting the challenges of radicalisation and extremism permeating through society.
* The documentary Insha’Allah Democracy on former Pakistani military ruler, Pervez Musharraf, evolved from being about a former key figure in the War on Terrorism to becoming political satire of a man who courted the West whilst at the same time tacitly supporting terrorist groups.
* The radical Islamist group Tehreek-e-Labbaik (TLP) has grown in popularity in Pakistan and become a political force. Under the pretence of blasphemy, its supporters have murdered secular politicians and foreigners and have been courted by the now-ousted former prime minister of Pakistan, Imran Khan.
* Documenting extremist groups and their leaders, whilst being objective, still inevitably carries risks, threats, and repercussions. Some of the entities being filmed like the notoriety.
* It is important to challenge the post-9/11 rhetoric that there was a war between religions and cultures. Much of this was due to failing to learn from lessons of history.
* Afghanistan had a burgeoning civil society, which included outstanding female journalists. It was terrifying how quickly Afghanistan collapsed to the Taliban in 2021.
Transcript:
SG: Dr. Sajjan Gohel
MN: Mohammed Naqvi
SG: Hello, and welcome to DEEP Dive, brought to you by NATO’s Defence Education Enhancement Programme. I’m your host, Dr. Sajjan Gohel. Each episode, we speak to experts and practitioners in international security and defence, counter-terrorism, and geopolitical current events to gain insight into the most pressing matters of global affairs.
In this episode, we speak to Mohammed Ali Naqvi, a Pakistani-American filmmaker whose films explore themes of human rights, social justice, politics, identity and radicalisation. Mohammed’s documentaries – which include Among the Believers, The Accused: Damned or Devoted? And Insha’Allah Democracy – have received multiple awards. Mohammed also served as Co-Executive Producer of the Netflix docuseries Turning Point: 9/11 and the War on Terror.
Please note, this podcast was recorded just prior to the no-confidence motion against Imran Khan which led to his removal as the Prime Minister of Pakistan on 9 April 2022.
Mohammed Naqvi, thank you for joining us on NATO DEEP Dive.
MN: Thank you so much and happy to join you.
SG: It’s a pleasure.
You are a documentary filmmaker who has looked at a lot of issues to do with what’s gone on inside Pakistan for many years and your documentaries are primary source information for some of the challenges that have occurred inside the country. One documentary that stood out for me was the one that you did several years ago called Inshallah Democracy where you spent time with the former military ruler of Pakistan, General Pervez Musharraf. Why did you want to focus on him for this documentary?
MN: That had a very long production process. When I first started filming Musharraf, it was in 2010, and it was literally a few months after his ouster from Pakistan and when he went into self-exile, so I went and met him in Dubai. And I can tell you that I was interested, obviously, in Pakistan’s own journey towards democracy and building a burgeoning, stronger civil society in government, and I thought that Musharraf would be such an interesting character to follow. One, because he was a military dictator, and two, he also played such an important role on the global stage. And, as luck would have it, with US intervention and foreign policy, they had historically backed some of our military dictators in Pakistan. And Musharraf was no exception. And I had good access to him. And I thought that this would be a great opportunity to get to know him personally and get to know what were some of the challenges that he had to face on the ground.
But what was interesting about this documentary, compared to the other documentaries that I’ve done, is that it’s somewhat of a political satire. And it’s also a first-person documentary in the sense that I’m in this film compared to my other films. And a lot of that had to do with me forming a close relationship with Musharraf, becoming friendly with him, and realising the many flaws that he had as a leader. And a lot of the reasons that I had actually supported him maybe in my youth were naive. So, it kind of became my own journey of political maturation. And essentially, it became a story of me voting for the first time in my life. And I should point out to you, that was the narrative of the film. I was basically following Musharraf, while he was attempting a political comeback, and running for election back in 2013, and post 2013. And so, that is basically how that concept first started.
SG: I was going to say it was very interesting seeing you filming that. And as you said, you were in the documentary itself. And you followed him around, not just in the United Arab Emirates, but also when, as you said, he was trying to make his political comeback in Pakistan, as well. You mentioned a lot of the flaws that he had, which is interesting, because I also noticed that your own opinion of him began to evolve and change in the documentary. What do you think were his main flaws?
MN: Well, he was a military dictator and believe it or not, there is no such thing as a benevolent dictator, in my opinion. And my story, why I decided to put myself in the film was, now purely speaking from a filmmaker and a storyteller standpoint, I was changing while I was filming him. And I kind of found that compelling because my own opinion of him was unravelling. I bought the hook, line, and sinker narrative of enlightened moderation that he had sold to the world when he first took office, and he first joined the war on terror.
For me as a Shiite minority security was important. Because I grew up in the 90s, where sectarian violence targeted a lot of people. Shiites, for example, many people in my community in the early 90s, in fact, one of my uncle’s was murdered, he was targeted by one of these militant groups. And when Musharraf came on, and he was this kind of secular, for lack of a better word, quote unquote, ‘moderate leader,’ who was pushing enlightened, moderation, and security. I bought that. I thought that was great and I wanted to support him.
But as I got to know him personally, once he was out of office, I saw a lot of that was kind of a performance. It was a bit of a facade, because even though on a personal level, he might be secular, and he might not be hard-line or supporting right wing fanatics, he kind of was supporting those groups, or at least as he said, in my documentary, turning a blind eye to them and using Taliban factions and militant groups as assets, geostrategic assets, in Afghanistan. And he continued to do that. That was for me how the penny dropped. And there’s a scene in the film, where I’m following him, and he goes to Washington, DC, right after Osama bin Laden has been caught in Abbottabad [Pakistan], 2011. And he meets with many power brokers in, in the States, various senators and congressmen. And he wants to shore up their support for his return to Pakistan, in the sense that, if he’s going to run for election in Pakistan, he wants the Americans to tacitly support him and back his campaign. And to also to clear his name that he never knew that Osama bin Laden was actually in Pakistan for the last five years, because some of those last five years would mean that it was during his tenure, and he wanted to clear his name.
And I was shocked at what I was seeing. Where he was continuing to, basically, privilege foreign policy and American people’s interests over some of the people in Pakistan and their interests. And he was playing this double game of being part of the War on Terror, and fighting against militancy, but then, at the same time, tacitly also supporting these militant groups in Afghanistan against India. And he didn’t realise that the fallout from that was increased militancy within our own borders within Pakistan. And that was really how my opinion totally changed for him, and I lost total faith in him as a leader.
SG: I remember that scene that you were talking about, where he had gone to the United States, and he was meeting people there, and basically wanting them to back him to return to power. And I was aghast myself to see somebody who wanted external support to enhance his own position inside Pakistan. So, it just shows you that I guess, if you can keep following somebody and documenting them, they will provide some quite revolutionary aspects of their life, which are also quite disturbing at the same time.
One other aspect I thought was curious about your documentary was that he seemed very keen to still exhibit a sense of grandeur of influence, almost like guiding you on occasions to film him looking at a photograph and getting you to then ask him about it, or even him reading out Facebook messages. Do you feel that he had become conscious that he was no longer relevant? That at one time this was the most important person in the War on Terrorism, and now, he was almost a forgotten footnote in what had happened to do with al-Qaeda and the Taliban and the whole dynamic of counter-terrorism.
MN: Oh, yes, absolutely. That is when I had come to begin filming him, and I don’t know many dictators, but I’d imagine that they all kind of full of themselves and Musharraf was no exception. But, in many ways, maybe that’s why I can assume he possibly even gave me the access and the permission to actually film with him this much, and with this much access, because I was actually still paying attention to him at a time when the rest of the world wasn’t. And so, that’s true, I agree with what you’re saying.
SG: Then you had also interviewed him when he was in Pakistan, where effectively he was under house arrest. His attempt to rehabilitate his political career ultimately, had failed. Do you feel that he was naive in thinking that he could go back to Pakistan and that he actually had standing and support? Is it one of those situations where you’re almost deluded when you’re outside the country, or people are maybe telling you you’re, you’re a hero, and you’re worshipped? And if you come back, you’ll be garlanded and you’ll be treated with huge reverence and respect? Do you think there was a sense of naivety?
MN: Certainly. I think with Musharraf, he was surrounded by a lot of ‘yes-men’ and people who kind of projected an image of his own grandiosity and how much he was still loved. Having said that, to be fair, there are a lot of diehard Musharraf fans and fanatics. I was a big supporter of his and that’s why I made this film because in a strange way, Musharraf brought about, if I’m being semi-optimistic, Pakistan’s own journey towards democracy, that he kind of solidified that. He hopefully is one of the last dictators. Of course, you can counter-argue and say, ‘well, the military establishment is still running the show in Pakistan, they just don’t have to do a coup anymore, they can just use a puppet person like Imran Khan.’ Yes. And I would say, yes, there’s merit to that argument.
But with Musharraf. The fact that we had our first civilian to civilian transfer government, at that time in 2013, and then, of course, subsequently, in 2018, that is at least something. It is like small steps, but these are big things, because we’ve never really had that since the inception of our country, right. And I think to traverse this specific period of Pakistan’s own journey towards self-rule, it was an interesting person, Musharraf, to guide us through this specific time period in Pakistan’s history.
And I was lucky enough to be there and to document it and Musharraf’s own journey, which ultimately led to failure, became a secondary arc and story to follow. Because beyond that, the bigger arc was my story. And what I mean by my story is me going through my own political maturation process, not falling for personality driven politics, or running to the military every time that there is an issue or when we feel threatened by safety and security. That old naivete I transcended in myself, and there are a lot of other people like me, who lived in a sequestered, privileged bubble and we all went through that same journey, and I wanted to represent that journey.
SG: Well, you did an excellent job in representing that journey.
One final aspect on Musharraf is what do you think his legacy has been in Pakistan that endures, both maybe negatively and positively?
MN: That’s an interesting question. Well, I guess you can say, one of the biggest legacies, I think, not just in Pakistan, but the world over is that he actually was one of the architects of the War on Terror. He was part of it, he was very much part of the U.S. coalition on the War on Terror. And he made Pakistan, it wasn’t just him, frankly, in a strange way, he kind of failed upwards. And that’s been kind of the legacy with Musharraf. He found himself in these leadership positions where he wasn’t supposed to be the guy. He wasn’t supposed to be the Army General, the Chief of Army Staff, and he wasn’t supposed to become president.
I guess he solidified Pakistan’s position in fighting this specific war, and made, perhaps, some of our regional concerns more important in the international community, where people actually started caring more about Pakistan’s specific interests and place in the world. Whereas I think prior to that, we were mostly ignored. Right. So, I don’t know if that’s necessarily Musharraf’s legacy, it just happened to be just the geo-forces and politics that were happening in the world and post-9/11. But he happened to be at the helm of Pakistan leadership. So, he gets attributed with that.
SG: It’s worth remembering, as you said, that maybe he wasn’t meant to be in that position. You have to track back to before 9/11 and even before the coup, because Musharraf was not the highest ranking general during Nawaz Sharif’s second term in office. But I believe the story is that the reason why Nawaz Sharif promoted Musharraf to Chief of Army Staff was because Musharraf was the only one who didn’t lobby for it. Precisely because he didn’t think he was going to get it. So, sometimes I guess fate has an odd way of thrusting people at specific times, which are very unanticipated.
MN: Yeah, he was the least likely to overthrow Nawaz Sharif in a coup, according to the Sharif brothers, that’s why they chose him. And he was fourth in line or something. He wasn’t supposed to and then and lo and behold, the West as you saw, what happened is history.
SG: Absolutely, hashtag irony there.
MN: Yeah, exactly.
SG: Another one of your documentaries, Mo, which was fascinating, it was riveting, mesmerising in almost a disturbing way I would say is The Accused: Damned or Devoted? where you spend a lot of time focusing on this group called the Tehreek-e-Labbaik (TLP). A group that, at that time, maybe people outside of Pakistan had not heard of, but is definitely getting global notoriety now. Tell me about why you wanted to do this documentary.
MN: So, the BBC Storyville, which is BBC Four’s feature documentary strand, had approached me to make a documentary on the blasphemy law in Pakistan, very open ended. And, as I’m sure you’re aware, it’s extremely dangerous for anyone to make anything on the blasphemy law, or even criticise it publicly, because you could be putting yourself, your family, and everyone in danger. We saw what happened to Salmaan Taseer, Governor of Punjab [in Pakistan], just for standing up for Asia [Bibi] (Christian woman accused of blasphemy), 10 years ago. His own security guard murdered him and then later became a martyr by the same group, the Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan.
So, when they first approached me, I declined. I just thought it was too much of a dangerous project to take on. And then it was the Fall [Autumn] of 2017, I think in September or October, I found myself in Islamabad. And it coincided at the same time when the Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan essentially shut all of Islamabad down, led by their leader, Khadim Hussain Rizvi, who was one of the main subjects in my documentary, and the leader of the Tehreek-e-Labbaik party. Him and his followers descended upon Islamabad, because there was this oath taking provision that was being amended and was recommended by the law minister at that time in Parliament, that they wanted to bring some changes to the language in taking an oath.
The inference that the Tehreek-e-Labbaik got from that was that it kind of was diminishing the glory of Prophet Muhammad and was hence blasphemous. And what they wanted was for parliament to retract this amendment, and basically have the law minister resign and have him be handed over to the Tehreek-e-Labbaik party. And even though Parliament had passed this resolution, they shut down all of Parliament, they shut down the city, and for three days, everything was at a standstill, I remember because I was supposed to fly back to Karachi, but instead, I was stuck in Islamabad, because airports and everything were closed. And then on the third day, the army got together and basically appeased the Tehreek-e-Labbaik and all of its [hundreds of thousands of] followers. And they even gave them 1,000 rupees [$5 USD] each, all the people who were protesting and forcing the parliament to close down.
And that enraged me—because I’d seen many times Pakistan, my country, fall prey to the political ambitions of despots. And here we had another one, and he was using Islam as a veneer. And I wanted to expose Rizvi for this. And I didn’t want our country to continue to cower or kowtow to these kinds of people. Here was a cleric who did not speak for me, he didn’t speak for other Muslims. And he only spoke for his own political ambitions, that this is what it was. And so, I decided to take on the project, and I decided to make him my focus, because that way, it would also kind of provide a cover for embarking on this project. And considering how dangerous it was to do this project…it wouldn’t be a victim-driven project. I mean of course we feature people, victims, in this film too, but we wanted to feature more the perpetrator, because we didn’t want to put any of our victims or anyone…any of those people in danger. We wanted to hear straight from the horse’s mouth and give him a fair chance and see what his thoughts are and see how he defends the blasphemy law and why he’s so popular. Just to kind of explore that.
SG: You spoke about the danger of this, and I wanted to ask you more about it, because are you not concerned about your own safety and security based on just how fundamental the TLP are and how motivated their cadres are on the streets?
MN: Certainly. One good thing is that all the subjects that were featured in my documentary — for example, Asia Bibi or Gulalai Ismail, the human rights activist fighting against the blasphemy law — they’re all abroad. So, I feel good about that. At least, that they’re not in danger. And then I also had my crew, my two specific producers who worked with me, Musharraf Shah and Moshin Abbas, both of whom were instrumental in gaining the access to Rizvi and filming with him—they’re also abroad. I go back and forth, and I mostly am abroad. And in a way, although I’ve screened The Accused around Pakistan—but in very ad-hoc and private settings, not publicly—it’s still a film that is mostly shown abroad. So, I don’t necessarily think that it would be safe for us to actually show the film publicly here in Pakistan, precisely because of the repercussions that could happen.
However, having said that, one of the biggest things that we had was that we attempted to be brutally neutral in projection of Rizvi and this issue. We were upfront with him, in the sense that we told him, “We’ll be filming with you, and we will also be filming with some of the people who have been accused of blasphemy. And both of you would get the shot and chance to share your testimony to a global audience, and what people decide is up to them, but we’re not going to falsify anything you say. We’re just going to show you as is and show you the story as is.” So, we did do that. And so far, so good.
I mean, just to kind of reference with you, I did another film called Among the Believers, in which we also follow the cleric, Maulana Abdul Aziz, who was the head cleric of this mosque in Islamabad—militant mosque—called Lal Masjid or the Red Mosque. And when that film came out, there was an immediate reaction from his camp, because they hadn’t seen the film, but they were responding to all the social media coverage that the film was getting in Western film festivals, like at Tribeca, and in Amsterdam, and wherever the film was being launched. And they specifically said that this director lied to us, and he’s made a film insulting Islam, and basically, he’s a kafir. It was all made up. It wasn’t true at all; they hadn’t even seen the film. So, they were just having a knee-jerk reaction as to what the press was.
I had to stop the film from distribution for a bit, I had to go back to Pakistan, and I had to show the cleric of the film. And I sat next to him, he watched the whole film, and I recorded him seeing the film. And I had him issue a statement, in which he said, “I don’t find anything wrong in this film. You’ve just shown basically my point of view, and then you’ve also shown people from the other side, their point of view, about how Pakistan should be run, and whether there should be a more specific form of Sharia or Islamic law brought about. And so yeah, I mean, there’s no issue. You didn’t falsify anything that I had to say in this film. It’s not against Islam.” And I took that soundbite from him, made a short video, and released it onto the internet—onto YouTube, Facebook, all those places. Oh, I should specify, the reason I had to stop the distribution is because we started getting a lot of threats. I got a lot of specific threats…death threats, specifically, through social media where they wanted me dead and that I should watch my back. And so, I needed to handle the situation right away. And that’s how we did it. And then the threats dissipated once that video went up through social media.
SG: That’s very frightening, what you’re conveying.
MN: Yeah. And also, my film was banned at that time in Pakistan. So, I had had some experience like this before filming with the leaders of militant groups. I mean, I’ve been making documentaries for the last 18 years, but if you look at the last 12 years, I’ve been very specific to follow the people in power, who are sometimes the oppressors. And the reason I do that is—I don’t do it because I’m trying to platform these people who I obviously disagree with—I’m literally showing them as is, and they’re using all this rope to hang themselves, if you will, obviously, right? But more so than that, because I work for a global audience, and a lot of the documentary audience is international and Western, I feel weird about going after some of the victims and featuring their stories—of course, I feature them in my film, too—but what I don’t want to do is poverty porn. And what I don’t want to do is, just from an ethical standpoint, get people who are already victims—to whom I have a lot more privilege and much more power…even though I have their consent, to get them to share their story and…for me to use their story and…I just don’t feel right about it. I find that exercise kind of exploitative. And it’s a good thing that these kinds of movements in nonfiction filmmaking, just from an overall standpoint, that that’s happening, and things are changing.
So, for me, filming with the leader of the Taliban, or a former dictator like Musharraf, or the head of TLP party, I feel a lot more comfortable filming with them—not because it’s not dangerous, it’s dangerous—but I feel comfortable from an ethical standpoint, because they’re a lot more powerful and privileged than me. I mean, they can have me killed, if they want. And there’s not much of a pushback that I can do against that. So, I feel more open to sharing their story. And beyond that, obviously sharing it with Pakistanis in the diaspora and then Pakistanis are able to see it here, to show the truth of people like Rizvi, how hypocritical they are, and how a lot of their piety and everything that they put out is very much a performance. It’s not about Islam, it’s not about religion, it’s about their own ambition for political power. And that’s what it was. They were literally using the blasphemy law as a platform for their electoral campaign; their song, their anthem for their political party was “Vote for us to earn your place in heaven.” I mean, come on. I went off on a tangent there, but yes.
SG: But you brought in some exceptionally important dynamics about your process, the filmmaking, the risks and the challenges that you face. And it sort of tracks back actually to the dynamic of the TLP that we’re talking about now. Since your documentary was made on them, Rizvi has passed away, his son has taken over. The TLP has gone through some very odd machinations, in the sense that they ended up becoming a proscribed group, and then it seemed that the proscribed tag was then removed by the Imran Khan government. It almost seems to be coming across like they are able to hold the government to ransom, because you’re looking at the TLP having not just staged protests, but they’ve committed very violent acts against the Pakistani security forces. They’ve murdered police officers.
There was this very disturbing incident in December of 2021 when TLP supporters lynched the Sri Lankan national, Priyantha Kumara in Sialkot. And if that wasn’t bad enough, his body was set alight, and you had TLP people taking selfies with the burning body. Now, how dangerous has this group become, to the extent that they can actually influence and shape policies in Pakistan, and where does Imran Khan stand on this group? Is he needing them because he needs support to keep his government afloat? Or is this ideological? If you could perhaps explain this, because it’s just so disturbing what is happening with the TLP right now.
MN: Well, when it comes to the blasphemy law specifically, and if I were to even reference the 2018 elections, a lot of the TLP supporters Imran Khan used to buttress his own political banks. And then when Asia Bibi was set free, he really had no choice but to actually get them arrested and thrown in jail and all of that. Keep in mind of course, this was once when Khadim Hussain Rizvi and some of the senior leadership of the TLP started calling out the military and started challenging them. And then you saw who really was in charge, and then they were all put in jail. And then, of course, they was set free again. I mean, how strong is the TLP? Well, it’s telling that a brand-new political party, when it ran for elections, garnered up to 2.2 million votes, third-largest in Punjab. And that’s extraordinary for a political party that was, I think, registered in 2017 or something, and it ran for election in 2018. And now—and it was 4% of the vote nationally—and now from what I understand, the vote back is even larger, and they actually have some candidates here in Karachi and in Sindh and in other places.
The thing about the TLP party is that even the people who were taking selfies with this abhorrent act that took place with Priyantha Kumara…it’s not just TLP party. I mean, they actually have a lot of support that goes beyond just politics. It’s purely from a strange ideological affinity, which, by the way, if you want to get into the history of the blasphemy law and how it was left over from the British government, and then how during Zia’s years, the Zia-ul-Haq years in the ‘80s…1989, the mid ‘90s…the rule was amended to eventually include the death penalty. If you were to actually go into the whole history of that—and I’m not a religious theologian—but there are people who would argue in its implementation—the way it’s been interpreted, the way it’s been used—religious scholars would, which is a whole other story.
Yes, it’s frightening—how much influence the Tehreek-e-Labbaik has. It seems to be growing—can they be stopped? I’ve seen historically, when the military decides, or the establishment decides to push back on groups, they can—they can certainly shut it down. Does the establishment back TLP? I don’t know. I mean, I think your guess would be as good as anyone else’s. I think, sometimes in Pakistan, the military establishment and the powers that be aren’t a monolith in themselves, I think they’re so themselves a myriad of different views. And there’s different factions within different factions within the deep state. But it seems to be—and again, this is just based on my observation—the fact that this group still exists and hasn’t been extinguished, is maybe there is some political asset that can be ascertained by our establishment for keeping them around, for keeping maybe the Nawaz brothers or the PML-N (Pakistan Muslim League – Nawaz) in check or maybe keeping PTI (Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf) in check. So, who knows?
SG: Well, that’s, I think, a disturbing account of what is taking place. And again, I guess history is repeating itself, where these extremist groups are seen as strategic tools to serve a political purpose, and it’s not always possible to control them in the way some people may think is possible. They are like Frankenstein’s monster; they will rebel.
MN: And they do. And we’ve seen that over and over, whether they were using Deobandi groups back in the day, or whether it’s like Barelvi-backed groups. So yes, I agree.
SG: So, in the final part of this, it’d be good to get your personal take on your experience in Afghanistan, because my understanding is that you were one of the last people out from Bagram, just before or during the process of the Taliban takeover. What abiding memories did you take with you? What did you feel? What concerned you, and what continues to concern you?
MN: So, when I was brought on to co-executive produce Turning Point: 9/11 and the War on Terror, which was a Netflix anthology series looking back the last 20 years, 9/11 and post-9/11, what have we learned, how have we changed? I had a very, very specific goal. It was great to be working with the rest of the team, I should mention Brian Knappenberger, who is the director of the series and Eve Marson and Lowell Bergman, who were also executive producers on the series. I was the only, you can say, well, Muslim, and someone from this part of the world, in the above the line credits from the producer and the directors on the series. And my big push was to show that despite spending trillions of dollars, there have been massive failures. And the other really big thing that I wanted to do was to dismantle the post-9/11 rhetoric that has existed—that still kind of permeates some of those stories and narratives that surround 9/11, specifically where Muslims are the evil force.
And I had the opportunity to film in Qatar, because that was…the series of talks that were taking place, negotiating the US pull-out with the Taliban and the Afghan national government. And we also got to film in Afghanistan and Pakistan, for that matter. And it was important to show and share these stories, because I wanted to transcend that binary of good versus evil. And I wanted to show that even the Taliban, and we spoke to, for example, Anas Haqqani who is Sirajuddin Haqqani’s brother, and we also filmed with Suhail Shaheen. And then we also filmed with some of the other Afghan warlords like Ismail Khan, Gulbadin Hekmatyar, some of whom were part of the original mujahideen.
So, the story of 9/11—and I think that was what was really important for us to put in the series—was that it begins way before 9/11. It begins with the US’ own Cold War strategy of backing these mujahideen groups, empowering them, and sending them to go do jihad against the Soviets. And once that’s all done and it’s accomplished, they leave, and of course, as we know, then follows a lot of civil war era until the Taliban come, historical forces that be. But I should point out that our team—and I would be remiss not to mention one of my producers on-ground in Afghanistan, Sultan Faizi, and just another assortment of amazing Afghan team that we had. We filmed with the NATO forces as they were withdrawing. We were one of the last documentary teams. This was in the summer of 2021, literally a few months before Kabul fell. We were filming in Bagram. And I knew then, and so did everyone else, how sideways this was all going to go and how bad things were going to happen. I just didn’t expect that it would fall literally in the speed that it did. That was kind of terrifying and sad. But, you know, there you have it.
And it was so sad, because a lot of the people that I met on-ground and the people that we were working with, they were the first Afghan nationals, who, at least in contemporary times, there was a burgeoning civil society, they were some of the most brilliant female journalists and producers that we’d also worked with, and they’d worked with us, and now all of a sudden, overnight, they were in danger, and they didn’t have any jobs, they were all fired. And they had to find ways to escape the country to save their lives. It was really, really harrowing. In fact, the last few months, we’ve been spending…just trying to get a lot of our crew out of Afghanistan, which, knock on wood, we’ve been able to do.
SG: Well, it’s a testament to you and how focused you are on covering the ground truth as to what’s taking place in Afghanistan and the tragedy that has befallen these poor people who are now at the mercy of the Taliban and the Haqqanis whom you mentioned.
Unfortunately, we don’t have more time, Mo, but I wish we could talk to you for many more hours, because it’s been riveting to talk to you. I feel like I’m actually in one of your documentaries, because you have provided a real tour de force as to what you do, how you do it, and why you do it, and the importance of it. And I’m very grateful for you spending the time to talk to us. And most importantly, please stay safe, and make sure you have protected yourself because you’re covering a lot of important angles and taking a lot of risks in the process.
MN: Thank you. That’s really kind of you to say, and inshallah, everything’s fine. And yes, so far, so good. But yes, thank you so much for having me. I really enjoyed myself here. Thanks.
SG: It’s a pleasure, and we look forward to having you again in the future.
MN: Yes, me too. Thanks.
SG: Thank you for listening to this episode of DEEP Dive. I’m your host, Dr. Sajjan Gohel. DEEP Dive is brought to you by NATO’s Defence Education Enhancement Programme. The production and research team are Marcus Andreopoulos and Victoria Jones. For additional content, including full transcripts of each episode, please visit: deepportal.hq.nato.int/deepdive.
Disclaimer: Please note that the views, information, or opinions expressed in the DEEP Dive series are solely those of the individuals involved and do not necessarily represent those of NATO or DEEP.