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Afghanistan’s War on Books

by Reza Mohammadi, 9 June 2009

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The Guardian, 8 June 2009

The Afghan government’s destruction of tens of thousands of books is another sign that the country’s culture is under threat

by Reza Mohammadi

The Afghan government last week threw tens of thousands of books into the Helmand river, in the south of the country. This peculiar story of animosity towards books has a history in Afghanistan as well as in its neighbouring countries.

Fourteen hundred years ago, when Arab Muslims first invaded the regions populated by Persians, they encountered an impressive library known as Jundi Shapur. The library was the largest of its kind and was located in the biggest university of the time. The commander of the Arab troops, Sa’ad Ibn Abi Waqas, wrote a letter to his superior, asking what should be done with the books. The superior’s answer was to check whether the books’ content complied with the Qur’an. If it did comply, then there would be no need for the books because the Qur’an itself was already available. If the books had nothing to do with the Qur’an, then they would be useless anyway. So the commander burned the library, including all its books.

Seven hundred years later, when the Mongol army invaded Baghdad, they encountered a huge library, the biggest of its kind in the world at the time. That day, the Tigris river was coloured red and black: red with the blood of thousands massacred by Gengis Khan’s army and black with library books thrown into the river.

The battle against books was repeated yet again – and in a tragic form – 700 years later. When al-Qaida and the Taliban ruled Afghanistan, they destroyed all libraries throughout the country, including the National Library and the library of Kabul university. At the time, Wasef Bakhtary, a famous Afghan poet, wrote a poem that said: "Salute to those who have discovered the fire, as today is the first day of celebration for the book burners".

Now, seven years after the fall of the Taliban, when numerous democratic countries are present in Afghanistan supporting freedom, including freedom of speech, and the government is run by technocrats rather than theocrats, the ministry of culture has made Helmand river’s water turn black after throwing tens of thousands books into it. These books include history and philosophy as well as works of literature and poetry and a sacred Shia book called Nahjulbalagha. They were published abroad by one of the few Afghan publishers, Ebrahim Shariati. This destruction has happened while the government allows books on exorcism, magic and fortune-telling to be made available to the people.

Three months ago, when the books arrived in the Nimruz border region, the provincial governor asked his superiors what to do with them. The ministry of culture ordered them to be thrown into the river. But the irony is that, unlike seven years ago, half of Afghanistan’s population now has access to the internet and can read the same books online. Of course the Afghan government cannot throw internet books into the river. However, it can sentence to death those who, like Parviz Kambakhsh, try to print books from the internet.

In Afghanistan today, there are more than 20 universities and various media outlets and many poets and writers who need books for research. The majority of writers, filmmakers and researchers do not have the opportunity to publish their work in Afghanistan. Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner, for example, is banned in his own homeland and the movie based on his novel is not shown. Similarly, Earth and Ashes by the Paris-based Afghan writer Atiq Rahimi (which became an instant bestseller in Europe and South America) and the movie based on this book (which won the Prix du Regard Vers l’Avenir at the Cannes film festival in 2004) have also been banned at the order of the Afghan culture ministry.

We can add to this list the arrest of writers and journalists and people who change their religions as well as filmmakers, poets and human rights activists who leave the country because of safety concerns. This is happening while drug smugglers, mafia gangs and new warlords are flourishing. Nowadays, the people of Afghanistan ask themselves what is the point of having western troops and thousands of NGOs in the country when intellectual freedom is curbed but crime is flourishing. People in the west are also asking themselves this same question. It’s hard to find a clear answer.