- Zahra Joya, Afghan journalist, author



SHOTLIST :
LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM
AUGUST 14, 2026
SOURCE: AFPTV

IMAGES (02:17)
1. 00:05-00:08 Extreme close-up UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya
2. 00:08-00:13 Mid shot UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya looking at her phone
3. 00:13-00:18 Extreme close-up UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya
4. 00:18-00:23 Wide shot UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya walking in London
5. 00:23-00:28 Extreme close-up UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya looking at photograph of herself in Kabul on phone
6. 00:28-00:40 Sound-up UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya looking at photographs of herself in Kabul on phone, saying "I was a very happy girl in Kabul"
7. 00:40-00:54 Sound-up UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya, saying: "I believe that my gender, my identity, everything about me is under attack in Kabul. So that's why I continue my work."
8. 00:54-01:00 Extreme close-up UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya looking at photograph of herself in her home province of Bamiyan
9. 01:00-01:07 Extreme close-up UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya looking at video of lake in Band-e Amir National Park in her home province of Bamiyan
10. 01:07-01:13 High angle shot UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya looking at photographs on her phone of herself playing football in the UK
11. 01:13-01:18 High angle shot UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya looking at photographs on her phone of herself playing football in the UK
12. 01:18-01:30 Sound-up UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya, saying: "It is difficult to explain how I miss the country. I miss Afghanistan. I miss the life that I had, and suddenly it stopped for me."
13. 01:30-01:44 Sound-up UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya, saying: Afghan women are fighting alone. They are in an unequal war and they are in (a) gender war. We need your solidarity."
14. 01:44-01:48 Mid shot UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya with her phone and her recently published book "The Vanishing Girl of Kabul"
15. 01:48-01:55 Close-up UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya signing a copy of her recently published book "The Vanishing Girl of Kabul"
16. 01:55-02:00 Extreme close-up UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya holding a copy of her recently published memoir "The Vanishing Girl of Kabul"
17. 02:00-02:05 Extreme close-up UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya holding a copy of her recently published memoir "The Vanishing Girl of Kabul"
18. 02:05-02:10 Close-up UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya reading from her recently published book "The Vanishing Girl of Kabul"
19. 02:10-02:16 Extreme close-up UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya reading from her recently published book "The Vanishing Girl of Kabul"
20. 02:16-02:22 Close-up UK-based Afghan journalist and author Zahra Joya reading from her recently published book "The Vanishing Girl of Kabul"

21. 02:23-02:57 SOUNDBITE 1 - Zahra Joya, Afghan journalist, author (female, 34 years old, English, 34 sec): 
"It's a heavy day for me because I lost everything in my country five years ago. And it's sorrow for us. But I really can't see or can't bear how Taliban are celebrating our sorrow in Afghanistan. It is a heavy day. And I wish strength and power to women and girls in Afghanistan."

22. 02:58-03:33 SOUNDBITE 2 - Zahra Joya, Afghan journalist, author (female, 34 years old, English, 35 sec): 
"From the Taliban perspective, everything, every single thing about myself was wrong. My dignity, my identity as a woman, my gender, my career as a journalist, and also my ethnicity as a Hazara woman. So I found it like it has, I mean, honestly, it's still five years later, it's still difficult for me to find the right words to describe how was my feeling that day."

23. 03:34-03:47 SOUNDBITE 3 - Zahra Joya, Afghan journalist, author (female, 34 years old, English, 13 sec): 
"Afghan women are fighting with this gender war with empty hands, because they have nothing in their hands. They are fighting with hunger as well."

24. 03:48-04:18 SOUNDBITE 4 - Zahra Joya, Afghan journalist, author (female, 34 years old, English, 30 sec): 
"In different parts of the world, Afghan women are just chanting for and seeking for help, for solidarity. We are alone in this war. And it is an unequal war against women in Afghanistan."

25. 04:19-04:47 SOUNDBITE 5 - Zahra Joya, Afghan journalist, author (female, 34 years old, English, 28 sec): 
"One of my colleagues recently told me that when she leaves the house for an interview, she is in a completely uncertain situation. She says, when I leave the house, I feel like I am a soldier going to the battlefield, and I don't know when I will be back, when I will be back safely or not."

26. 04:48-05:23 SOUNDBITE 6 - Zahra Joya, Afghan journalist, author (female, 34 years old, English, 35 sec): 
"I think one thing is clear, that this is a... the Taliban regime is an authoritarian regime. They want to control the society with force, with fear, and they marginalised half of the population, and still they claim that it is our internal issue. What is going on in Afghanistan is a deep human rights crisis."

27. 05:24-06:03 SOUNDBITE 7 - Zahra Joya, Afghan journalist, author (female, 34 years old, English, 39 sec): 
"Now, the most important thing is that the young generation of Afghanistan, women's generation, they are out of the circle, of education circle now. So now, five years, imagine that those girls that were in the sixth grade in school, this year they were graduated, but now they stuck in sixth grade, and there is no space for them."
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TEXT STORY

UK-based Afghan writer pleads for country's 'abandoned' women

London, United Kingdom - AUGUST 15, 2026 10:10:39 GMT - AFP

Afghanistan's women are "fighting alone" against discrimination by the Taliban authorities and feel abandoned by the world, Afghan journalist Zahra Joya told AFP.
"I lost everything in my country five years ago," she said in an interview in London.
The founder in 2020 of Rukhshana Media -- a news agency which aims to amplify the voices and stories of Afghan women -- the 34-year-old left Kabul in 2021 after the Taliban movement returned to power. 
As the fifth anniversary of that day loomed, she has struggled to come to terms with how her homeland has changed.
"I really can't see or can't bear how (the) Taliban are celebrating our sorrow in Afghanistan. It is a heavy day and I wish strength and power to women and girls in Afghanistan."
Joya, from the Hazara ethnic minority -- historically one of the most discriminated groups in Afghanistan -- recalled the shock of August 15, 2021, remembering "a scary time" and "horrible moment".
The previous week, she had had lunch with a friend in a Kabul restaurant and walked around in the capital working as a journalist.
"Then the next week ... I was in prison in my house," she said, noting "the first thing" the Taliban government did for women was order them to stay home.
Joya had never imagined leaving her country, but shortly afterwards fled to Britain.
"From the Taliban perspective, everything -- every single thing -- about myself was wrong," she explained. 
"My dignity, my identity as a woman, my gender, my career as a journalist, and also my ethnicity as a Hazara woman."


- 'Gender war' -


Joya spent some of her childhood living under the previous Taliban administration during which time girls' education was officially banned, before the hardline group which imposes its strict interpretation of Islam was ousted from power in 2001.
She nonetheless disguised herself as a boy to attend school, taking the boy's name Muhammad.
"The idea came to my mum," she recalled. "She made me a boy. She made boy clothes for me. She cut my hair and I went to school."
Following their 2021 return to power, Taliban authorities have closed high schools and universities to women and girls over the age of around 12, alongside imposing a series of rules on women's access to public life.
It is the only country in the world where girls' education is banned after primary school. 
In Britain, Joya continues to work with journalists who have remained in Afghanistan, operating there in the utmost secrecy because of the personal security risks. 
She recently collaborated with British newspaper The Guardian, asking Afghan women "what life "looks like on an ordinary day to you". 
"We're surrounded by four walls," was the overwhelming response, Joya noted.
A by-fellow at the University of Cambridge, Zoya in July published a memoir, "The Vanishing Girl of Kabul" chronicling her life story and the fate of Afghan women.
"Afghan women are fighting alone," she told AFP.
"They are in a gender war. We need your solidarity," she urged the world. 
"If there is any possibility to help us, share our stories, listen to us, and make your government accountable in terms of engagement with the Taliban."
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