DATELINE: AFGHANISTAN: Sunday, April 21, 2002:
06/11/2002
I've been reporting in Afghanistan for five days. My translator, Hashim Mohmand, says there's no rush, but I am supposed to obtain a government press pass to work here.
We head to the Foreign Ministry, a granite building in the heart of downtown Kabul, where all journalists are required to register.
Sitting in a musty office, behind a metal desk, a man takes my passport and tells me to sit.
"Are you going to Kandahar?" the man asks.
I say I'm not sure.
"If you go to Kandahar, then I have a car you can use," he says.
Mohmand tells him we already have a car and driver. The official glances at my passport and the sheet of paper on his desk, waiting for a signature.
There will be no press pass today. The official says he needs his supervisor's approval and his supervisor is in a meeting.
Angrily, Mohmand tells me it's time to leave. Outside, Mohmand says he refuses to be extorted by a government official. We decide to come back to the Foreign Ministry in a few days.
We walk back to the car and return to work.
Monday, April 22, 2002:
We reach the Kabul city limits shortly before noon. This is my first trip outside of Kabul, where international peacekeepers are on patrol. Beyond Kabul, there are no promises of security, only warnings of banditry and lawlessness.
The checkpoint consists of two soldiers and a stop sign. When the soldiers see a Westerner in the back seat, they wave us through. We honk at a boy holding a rope across the road. He lowers the rope.
We drive north through the open fields of the Shomali Plains.
Purple flowers sprout from the ruins of empty villages. Bushes, once bursting with grapes, look like black tarantulas crawling through the grass. The Taliban slashed and burned these vineyards. This used to be the breadbasket of Afghanistan.
After 30 minutes, we pull off into the village of Kalakan, and park outside a cluster of houses made of cement and sand. Ghoulraham, 50, greets us at the door and shows us inside. In the corner of the dirt floor, there's a sagging twin bed frame and a blackened tea kettle. The roof is missing.
"We came back because this is our home," he says.
The father of seven, Ghoulraham was forced out of this village three years ago by the Taliban. He lifts his shirt to reveal a six-inch scar on his abdomen. The Taliban stabbed him, he says, and burned down his house.
He moved his family back to Kalakan three days ago.
Beyond the wall, there's the crackle of gunfire. I jump and a little girl in a black velvet dress standing next to me giggles.
Abdul Jabar, 27, walks into the hut, holding a Kalashnikov. He looks angry and tells us to follow him.
He leads us to a dirt mound, about a five-minute drive. A gaggle of soldiers stand on the mound outside a white tent. We are told to wait for the chief.
Abdul Halime Rahime appears 20 minutes later. He sits down without shaking hands or making eye contact with me.
Rahime, 48, explains that all visitors and humanitarian supplies must go through him. I apologize.
A former commander with the Northern Alliance, Rahime still hasn't looked at me. I'm tempted to leave. But Hashim Mohmand, my translator, tells me it's safe. Rahime invites us to lunch.
We walk with the commander to a mud compound, where the men are lined up to eat in a weedy courtyard. A collection of rocket launchers and automatic weapons stretches from one end of a terrace to the other.
I step in line.
Tuesday, April 23, 2002:
Mohmand walks into the Foreign Ministry and tells the official in the press office what he was hoping to hear: "If we go to Kandahar, we will use your car," he says.
The man looks satisfied. He fills out the permission form and attaches my photo to it. "With this, you can work anywhere in Afghanistan," he says.
The government official asks when we will need his car. Mohmand tells him we'll get back to him.
-- Michael Corkery
