BBC has covered the story of Timothy Weeks in this report.
He is an Australian academic released by the Taliban in prisoner swap. Here is one of his quotes:
One explanation for the softer sentiments of Mr Week will be the Stockholm Syndrome. This too leaves two points unanswered.
Firstly BBC is blowing a different trumpet from US. We remember Tony Blair as UK Prime Minister making a world tour, including India, in support of US President George Bush's agenda in Iraq. The same attitude is not reflected in BBC headlines and reports now that US has been talking to the Taliban. When you are talking to an entity, here Taliban, then you have to have a public posture of not being biased when you go to the talking table.
It is true that it is the US and not the UK who is talking to the Taliban. But this leads to a worse problem - that there is serious division in the west about the status of Taliban. Either it a legitimate agency to talk to or not.
Clearly we are seeing a shift in the US policy towards whom they, the US, were calling the terrorists till yesterday. Such policy shifts are huge operations and it takes time to turn all the relevant wheels.
The second unattended question regarding negative portrayal of Taliban is the larger question - there is the western (US, UK, BBC) narrative about the situation in the Muslim lands. This narrative is that they, the west, are dealing with the terrorists. I am sure there will be the narrative of the so called terrorists.
I am calling so called terrorists because either the Taliban are the terrorists and hence completely condemned or they are respectable enough to hold talks with.
All this still leads an uncovered frontier and that is most important - what is the Muslim narrative of these issues. After all these are the Muslims who have their interests at stake in all this. Does the Muslim World accept the west as the unanimous global policing agency or not? Do they a have their own take on the matter?
As a result should we expect BBC to change the tone, attitude and presentation of their news about Afghanistan?
He is an Australian academic released by the Taliban in prisoner swap. Here is one of his quotes:
"I don't hate them at all," he said. "And some of them I have great respect for, and great love for, almost. Some of them were so compassionate and such lovely, lovely people. And it really led me to think about... how did they end up like this?"Yet the BBC presentation on this news and the related items is completely different. The headline of the above report itself is:
It is not as positive as the sentiments expressed in the earlier quote. Indeed any captivity can not be anything but an ordeal yet the mood of the headline does not match the sentiments of the captive about the Taliban.Timothy Weeks recalls Taliban hostage ordeal - 'I never gave up hope'...
One explanation for the softer sentiments of Mr Week will be the Stockholm Syndrome. This too leaves two points unanswered.
Firstly BBC is blowing a different trumpet from US. We remember Tony Blair as UK Prime Minister making a world tour, including India, in support of US President George Bush's agenda in Iraq. The same attitude is not reflected in BBC headlines and reports now that US has been talking to the Taliban. When you are talking to an entity, here Taliban, then you have to have a public posture of not being biased when you go to the talking table.
It is true that it is the US and not the UK who is talking to the Taliban. But this leads to a worse problem - that there is serious division in the west about the status of Taliban. Either it a legitimate agency to talk to or not.
Clearly we are seeing a shift in the US policy towards whom they, the US, were calling the terrorists till yesterday. Such policy shifts are huge operations and it takes time to turn all the relevant wheels.
The second unattended question regarding negative portrayal of Taliban is the larger question - there is the western (US, UK, BBC) narrative about the situation in the Muslim lands. This narrative is that they, the west, are dealing with the terrorists. I am sure there will be the narrative of the so called terrorists.
I am calling so called terrorists because either the Taliban are the terrorists and hence completely condemned or they are respectable enough to hold talks with.
All this still leads an uncovered frontier and that is most important - what is the Muslim narrative of these issues. After all these are the Muslims who have their interests at stake in all this. Does the Muslim World accept the west as the unanimous global policing agency or not? Do they a have their own take on the matter?
As a result should we expect BBC to change the tone, attitude and presentation of their news about Afghanistan?