Ekeomah Atuonwu
Facebook has suspended the pages of the Taliban-run Afghanistan National Television and Bakhtar news agency, demonstrating the firmness of its anti-Taliban stance.
According to Khaama Press, the Afghanistan National Television and Bakhtar news agency websites are no longer accessible. The Taliban also reportedly engaged in intensive media operations after seizing control of ANT’s media center. The websites for both the media center and the Bakhtar news agency, however, are now not accessible.
One of the most popular social networking sites in the world, Facebook, was the first to label the Taliban as a terrorist group after they took control in the middle of August 2021.
The article claimed, citing sources, that the social media company views the Taliban as a “terrorist organization” and has forbidden the posting of any content made by or endorsing this group on its platform.
Notably, Facebook has previously blocked the social networking site’s sites for Taliban-run government organizations in war-torn Afghanistan.
Meta applies its anti-Taliban policy across all of its platforms, including Facebook itself, Instagram, and WhatsApp, said a Facebook representative. Officials and spokespeople for the Taliban are frequent users of Twitter.
The Afghan media community continues to face overwhelming challenges under the brutal regime of the Taliban. Numerous organizations were forced to shut down due to economic collapse, threats and draconian reporting restrictions since the Islamist outfit came to power.
Thousands of journalists and media professionals, especially women, have lost their jobs. The survey, conducted by Afghanistan National Journalists Union (ANJU) across 33 provinces, shows 318 media outlets have closed since 15 August, 2021.
The crisis has hit newspapers the hardest with just 20 out of 114 continuing to publish. 51 TV stations, 132 radio stations and 49 online media have ceased operations according to the report; 72 per cent of those who have lost their jobs are women.
According to some media-supporting organizations, over 70 per cent of media outlets halted their operations since the Taliban came to power.
