Leading Afghan journalist Hojatullah Mujadadi was acquitted Wednesday at the end of a two-day trial on a trumped-up charge of abetting insurgents, according to Paris-based press freedom group Reporters sans Frontières (RSF).
A former National Radio reporter who now runs Radio Kapisa FM, a station based in the northeastern province of Kapisa, Mujadadi was arrested by the National Directorate of Security (NDS), Afghanistan’s leading domestic intelligence agency, on September 18.
Shortly after his release at the end of the trial, Mujadadi told RSF: “Life in prison was harsh but I am in good health. After all that happened, I believe more than ever in my work as a journalist. I thank all the freedom of expression organizations in Afghanistan and abroad. My release is the result of their solidarity.”
NDS spokesman Saeed Ansari had earlier told RSF that the NDS has the right to detain “any suspect in a terrorism case for an indefinite period.” After confirming that Mujadadi’s case had been sent to the prosecutor, he promised RSF to reexamine the case file to see if there was any possibility of Mujadadi being released quickly.
Since his arrest on the day of the most recent parliamentary elections on September 18, Mujadadi’s case was marked by serious irregularities and barefaced lies by certain officials. RSF discovered that his arrest was carried at former Kapisa governor Ghulam Ghawis Abubaker’s request, with the help of two of his sons-in-law, the parliamentarian Mohammad Eghbal Safi and the NDS representative in Kapisa province, Khajeh Zafar. The NDS had claimed that a suspect from Kandahar who is also being held by the security services had accused Mujadadi of being an accomplice of insurgent groups.
