MEDIA WAR

War reporting on the Afghanistan War Using Cerulo's Framework

War reporting on the Afghanistan War Using Cerulo's Framework

Afghanistan is predominantly an Islamic country, constituting 84% of the inhabitants as Sunni Muslim. They are the adherent of Hanafi1 school of Jurisprudence; rest of the populations is Shia, mainly Hazara (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afghanistan, 2009: 2).

Despite efforts of the former Soviet Union to change Afghan's society into a secular one, as well as the US efforts, nothing could drastically change the life style of Afghans. Religion and cultural traditions, and hardly anything else, shade the codes of life in Afghanistan and provide the fundamental basis of controlling people's personal conduct and resolving disputes of all kind.

Afghanistan is an agriculture country with the majority of its population employed in this sector. Although only about 20% of the total land area is economically conducive, agriculture and animal husbandry are among the most significant items of the national product. The major crop is wheat, whereas other products include fruits, nuts, wool and mutton. Industry is based on agriculture and pastoral raw material. Natural resources are comprised of natural gas, petroleum, coal, copper ore, sulphor, lead, zinc, barites, salt, precious stones and iron ore. Natural gas is its main exportable commodity. There is a low production of soap, furniture, shoes, cooper and hand woven carpets. Due to long war and internal tribal strives, export from Afghanistan has since long been confined to opium and hashish. Illegal trade of these banned items is rather the only source of foreign exchange inflow to the country. Its export could reach to a minimal level during the short Taliban regime in 2001-02, which is unprecedented in the recent past.

Media system in Afghanistan does not reflect a better picture than other sectors of the society. It never grew exponentially in terms of variety of products and technology, unlike the wave of technological development one can witness in the under-developed and developing countries of the world. One can hardly comment on its freedom as it has more often been a victim of unrest and wars. As we understand that the media development process involves, among others, the growth and the structure of media institutions as well as the prevalence, the pervasiveness, and the significance of their role performance in socio-cultural transformation of the society. The main reason for media retardation and disfunctionalism might have to do with the problems in the polity of the country. (Baran & Davis, 2009: 209).

Many newspapers and periodicals stopped appearing on regular basis, in large number of cases, ceased publication during the civil war. Following the defeat of Taliban in late 2001, a number of newspapers and periodicals resumed publication and a sizable appeared for the first time. In February 2009, the media law was amended, removing most restrictions on independent media. News papers and periodicals were required to obtain a license under the legislation. By early 2008, more than 250 publications had been registered with the Ministry of Information and ...