Kate Clark is a British journalist. She was based in Kabul, Afghanistan in 1999 as a foreign correspondent. On March 14, 2001, the Taliban ordered her expelled.[1] At that time, she was the only western reporter based full-time in Afghanistan. Her expulsion was seen as a reaction to her reports on the Taliban's destruction of the Buddhist statues at Bamiyan.[2][3]
Kate Clark | |
|---|---|
| Nationality | British |
| Occupation | journalist |
The Committee to Protect Journalists condemned the Taliban's expulsion of Clark.[4] It said that since there is no independent domestic press in Afghanistan many Afghans relied on the short-wave broadcasts the BBC transmitted in Dari and Pashto.
Clark continued to report on Afghanistan, from outside its borders, and returned to Kabul on 15 November 2001, after the Taliban retreat.[5]
In September 2002, Clark was able to interview Wakil Muttawakil, the former Taliban Foreign Minister.[6] He told her that he had first heard rumors that Al-Qaeda was planning a large sneak attack in the continental United States, and that he immediately took steps to warn the United States Department of State. Clark described this as a "massive failure of intelligence".
In May 2010, Clark left the BBC and joined the research group Afghanistan Analysts Network.[7]
References edit
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Sanjay Suri (14 March 2001). "Taleban expel BBC correspondent". BBC News. Archived from the original on 6 July 2015. Retrieved 5 July 2015.
Kate Clark has reported for the BBC from Afghanistan since Autumn 1999, and is the only foreign correspondent working for an international news organisation to be based in Kabul.
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Kate Clark (12 February 2001). "Taleban 'destroy' priceless art". Kabul: BBC News. Archived from the original on 28 January 2006. Retrieved 5 July 2015.
Reports started to circulate last week that the Taleban were destroyed non-Islamic artefacts in the museum, including statues of the Buddha dating back nearly 2,000 years.
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"The world this week". The Economist. 15 March 2001. Archived from the original on 6 July 2015.
Afghanistan's ruling Taliban expelled Kate Clark, a BBC correspondent, for reporting criticism of the destruction of the country's Buddhist statues.
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"CPJ condemns Taliban's expulsion of BBC reporter from Afghanistan". Committee to Protect Journalists. 14 March 2001. Archived from the original on 6 July 2015. Retrieved 5 July 2015.
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is dismayed by the ruling Taliban militia's decision to expel BBC correspondent Kate Clark from Afghanistan. Authorities ordered Clark to leave the country within 36 hours in response to BBC reports about the militia's destruction of ancient Buddhist statues in Bamiyan, some 100 miles northwest of the capital, Kabul.
- ^ Kate Clark (15 November 2001). "Kabul opens its arms to the unknown". New Zealand Herald. Retrieved 5 July 2015.
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Kate Clark (7 September 2002). "Taliban ex-foreign minister released". The Independent. Archived from the original on 6 July 2015.
The minister then ordered him to alert the US and the UN about what was going to happen. But in a massive failure of intelligence, the message was disregarded because of what sources describe as "warning fatigue".
- ^ Cockburn, Andrew (2015). Kill Chain: The Rise of the High-Tech Assassins. p. 196. ISBN 9781250081636.