Guns

Maidan Shar – Wardak province

Maidan Shar, 45 minutes drive from Kabul, is the capital of Wardak Province. This place has been in the news many times for attacks to western soldiers. Various armed groups are active in this province. We usually just call them all Talibans, but the reality is obviously more complex than that.

I came here with an Afghan journalist. She introduced me to the governor and then we made two different trips to this province with him.

The first day was really frustrating. Security is critical here, and we are allowed to drive just around the governor residence compound. We walk to the main street of Maidan Shar to a tiny group of shops they call “market”. We drive to the nearest hill to have a view of the valley. From here we can see different villages but it’s impossible to go there, basically because Talibans live there. I struggle to take some pictures, basically of walls, shops and children, not much more.

The governor is being helpful with us. He leave us attend a meeting with a US official and some guys from the state department.

The governor and a mullah are working to establish e militia of locals to patrol the villages. Apparently they are doing a good job, some of them were Taliban before. We decide to work on this story. This mullah, aka “Mullah Loudspeaker” is impressively progressive. He’s working with the Afghan government and is already been threatened by the Taliban several times for what he’s doing.

On the second day he drives us to a couple of military post close by, we interview them and I take some pictures. For me the ideal thing would have been to spend some time with them, but I couldn’t, too dangerous, all I have is just couple of hours.

Some days later we come back to Wardak to try to meet the guys that where fighting with the Taliban before. To meet them we need to go more further outside the provincial capital. In the morning there is a brief discussion with the governor to decide if it’s safe to go there. We decide to go, he gives us 3 police car with a lot of heavily armed guys on it.

After the last check-point in the “safe” area we see holes on the road caused ieds (improvised explosive devices), and wrecked trucks abandoned on the side of the road.

There are many long convoys of trucks; this road is an important supply route, and often a target. Being on a police car on this road doesn’t make me feel really safe.

There are guns everywhere, everybody seems to have one.

We arrive safe to the militia post. We interview the guys. I start taking some pictures, but always in the same small room.

I need to see them at work, patrolling in the villages, without Police. I sit in the back of the pick up with them, and we go, everything look more relaxed now, they joke with each other and are very nice to me. We go into a village; it’s beautiful to be able to see these places, there is no other way to get here.

Everything is really fast, I shoot whatever I can. And then we are already on our way back, hope to sell this story, I risked my life to shoot it.