It provides me with a reasonable income, lots of support, excitement, danger, fun, great lunches, excellent dinners and a network of solid friends and contacts. Daisy gives me unconditional love, so I guess the only thing I’m missing in the morning is a cuddle, good sex and breakfast in bed. And, let’s face it, girls, how many of us get that every day?
I’m not sure what the male perspective is. I long ago gave up trying to understand men. And it must be quite difficult being a man in the twenty-first century, because women don’t like wimps. But they really can’t be bothered with macho oiks, either.
No, after three failed marriages I think I’ll stick to being a mother and a journalist and try to do justice to both and to the best of my ability. I had dinner recently with a good friend of mine called Barry Atwan, who is editor of Al-Quds, the London-based Arabic daily. We sort of mulled over the exes in my life and I reflected: ‘You know, I’m probably a prime example of why arranged marriages aren’t that bad an idea.’ He looked at me seriously for several seconds until he couldn’t hold his face straight any longer, and he erupted into uncontrollable laughter.
Barry is one of the few journalists in this world who have interviewed Osama bin Laden, so he is a regular media commentator on the subject and has been in front of the cameras virtually nonstop since 11 September. We first met several months after he had done his world-famous interview with the world’s most infamous man.
I was planning to go over to Pakistan and Afghanistan and naturally, like any journo, I wanted that interview and wanted some advice and tips. Bin Laden, he said, was extremely cautious and you could not carry anything electronic on your person, or even wear a watch. He said many people would promise me bin Laden but they would fail to deliver and I had to be cautious in my approaches.
I realised it was going to have to be another long-haul project. Ahmed Jibril took nearly a year to get access to and it was quite obvious ObL would take much longer. Still, you know what they say: ‘slowly, slowly, catchee monkey’.
I afraid that’s another trait I have. I’m not sure whether it’s a good or bad quality, but I never ever give up or lose faith if I believe in what I am doing. At the other end of the scale, though, if I think I can’t do something, I walk away from it rather than fail.
I hate to fail because I hate to feel negative about anything. I don’t do negative! When I’m down I play this nauseating little game that I picked up from the 1960 Hayley Mills film Pollyanna. For those of you who don’t know, Pollyanna was an orphan who used to play the Glad Game when she felt sad. Even if something awful happened in her life she would still think of something to be glad about. Pass the sick bags, please! I wonder what Pollyanna would find to be glad about if she had three broken marriages and countless wrecked relationships? Anyway, at this point my determination to get into Afghanistan and my belief in my job were rock solid. Who knows, I might even achieve my ultimate goal of interviewing Osama bin Laden.
4
DAISY, DAOUD AND DANGER
Pasha arrived early to pick me up and I said it was time to pay another call to the Afghan Embassy in Islamabad. The visa I thought I was going to pick up the other day at 9 a.m. turned out to be Scotch mist. However, I thought I ought to persevere.
I popped my covered head around the door and the visa man looked exasperated. ‘I have five hundred visa applications now and they will all be duly processed in Kabul but we are not giving out any just yet. Come back next week,’ he sighed.
Undeterred I said, ‘I really need to get out to your country and write a balanced account of what’s happening. I hear that lots of tribal people are going over the border to give blood at the Afghan hospitals in the event of an American strike. You can have a pint of mine if you’ll just give me a visa.’
The offer was met with disbelief and raised eyebrows. I wasn’t sure whether he thought I was mad or the offer of an infidel’s blood was offensive. Anyway, from the stony-faced response, I could see I was getting nowhere fast.
Pasha giggled when I came back empty-handed. ‘You are not invincible. Perhaps you have met your match at last.’ I said there was more than one way to skin a cat and we would have to put our heads together for the answer.
We then headed off for a government office where visas are issued for Kashmir, and I submitted an application. I told the official that I had a few days off and wanted to go to the region as a tourist.
‘We will let you know in three weeks’ time,’ he replied curtly after taking my documents. He then walked away and refused to return to the serving hatch, so I left exasperated. I wanted an entry into Kashmir because I knew that was where one of the Al Badr terrorist organisation’s training camps was based, which may be bombed by the Americans as a legitimate terrorist target.
I told Pasha of my plans, and we visited several tatty little offices on the outskirts of Islamabad where Al Badr and mujahedin (meaning guerrilla – sometimes spelled ‘mujahedeen’) organisations were based. Each time I said I was a British journalist and wanted to go to one of the training camps I received strange looks. Pasha intervened and, speaking in Urdu, he explained who and what I was and what I wanted to do.
At least that was what I think he was saying! The conversation went on for a long time at one particular office and, judging from their side glances and smiles, I think he told them that I was completely potty but harmless and had good intentions. At the mujahedin office we met a young Pakistani man called Mumtaz, and he said he would try to arrange a trip for me.
We then drove off to a printer’s because I needed some business cards produced to replace my London ones, which all bore the Express’s familiar Crusader logo. Fearful that the logo would give people the wrong impression, the printer reproduced my card without the famous knight.
The last thing I wanted to do was alienate or offend the Muslims I was dealing with just because President Bush had earlier banged on about a ‘crusade’ against terrorism. I was fearful of being linked to any anti-Islamic feeling.
It was a scrappy sort of day, so we went off for a coffee to work out what we would be doing that week. ‘If the training camps of Kashmir aren’t available, the only other thing I can think of is going into Afghanistan,’ I said. ‘It should make a good story because hundreds of thousands of people are trying to leave and I’d like to talk to the people who are remaining. I want to meet some Afghan women and talk to them. What do you think?’
Pasha made a few phone calls and then handed me his mobile, saying that someone wanted to talk to me. The man on the other end of the line said this could be done for around $1,200 dollars and I would be taken to Daur Baba in Afghanistan.
‘You want twelve hundred dollars so I can stick my toe in the border?’ I barked. ‘I don’t think so. Do you really think my head’s zipped up at the back? Take me to Jalalabad and around the villages and we have a deal. I’m not going to pay for a silly stunt: I have to go right into the country. Take it or leave it.’ I handed the mobile back to Pasha.
Pasha spoke some more to the man and his voice increased in volume. The waiter was looking over in our direction and so was an innocuous-looking Pakistani gentleman sitting behind us reading a newspaper. I glanced back at the stranger and he seemed to be scribbling notes on the paper. I became nervous.
I scribbled my own note to Pasha. It read, ‘Lower volume of voice. Possible ISI [Pakistan’s intelligence service] behind.’ He closed the conversation and we went our separate ways and regrouped at his old yellow car, which may have been battered, with air conditioning that seemed to have a mind of its own, but the engine had the heart of a lion and it did the job. There was no sign of the man in the café, and we headed back to the hotel.
There were a lot of ISI agents hanging around the hotels in Islamabad, monitoring what the media were up to. I swear one of the waiters behind the buffet was a spy – he certainly didn’t know one end of a spoon from the other and he looked quite perplexed when asked to do anything more testing than passing a plate.
We had to pass the Afghan Embassy on our way back and I realised there was a press conference on the go, because the streets were lined with TV vans, cars and journos. I decided to pop in, and there was the Taliban ambassador, making his latest statement in the garden. Most of the hacks were sitting on the grass while the cameras were balanced precariously on tripods around the uneven ground.
CNN’s chief international correspondent, Christiane Amanpour, was firing questions and trying to be heard while others were also throwing questions at Mullah Abdul Salam Zaeef. Honestly, those guys really needed some marketing advice or spin doctors. I moved round to the right of the garden and stood next to Susumu Arai, the Phnom Penh bureau chief of Japan’s daily newspaper, the Yomiuri Shimbun. We had met earlier in the day, both pleading for visas to Afghanistan.
Just then a rickety old speaker, perched haphazardly in a tree, dropped out and hit one of his colleagues on the head. Those in our immediate area looked around and saw this dazed and confused reporter rubbing his bonce. I could not resist shouting, ‘Look, the first casualty of war!’ There were a few sniggers and one of the heavy-turbaned, heavy-bearded Taliban Embassy officials glowered in my direction. He was definitely suffering from a sense-of-humour failure.
The press conference was bizarre and in between statements passages of the Qur’an were relayed to the assembled bunch, who represented probably forty-plus countries from around the world.
Presentation, content and delivery – nul points. I felt a tinge of embarrassment for them because they just had no idea how to deal with the media. We could be their greatest asset, I reflected, and yet they just don’t know how to use us. I filed some copy to the Daily Express foreign editor, Gabriel Milland, because I knew that my Daily colleague David Smith was ferreting away in Peshawar.
It had been a fairly scrappy sort of day, so I headed back to the hotel. I spoke to my mother and father and they were fine. Joyce was more relaxed about Islamabad once she realised it was an alcohol-free zone. She hates my drinking and goes mad when my sister Viv tells her I’ve been quaffing champagne. She just regards it is a complete extravagance and a waste of money. Whenever I go home I tell everyone I’m off to the Betty Ford clinic! No smoking, no drinking and ‘eat your greens’ and ‘have some fruit, it’s full of Vitamin C and will do you good’.
She asked about Pasha and she said she wanted to thank him for looking after me and asked if she could speak to him. I mean, how embarrassing is that? I bet John Simpson and Kate Adie don’t get this sort of hassle!
She asked me what I had planned for the week and I said I didn’t really know. Perhaps I would just have a quiet week. Something would emerge, I was sure, I remarked. Naturally I could not, dare not, mention that I’d been to the Afghan Embassy three times hassling for a visa; nor could I mention my two projects.
Mums have a sixth sense, though, and mine can smell cabbage boiling in Manchester. ‘You just stay away from that Kashmir region or else you’ll be kidnapped and we’ll never see you. You want to think of Daisy – that bairn needs a mother.’ I felt really awkward because I don’t like lying to my mum, or anyone else for that matter. Silence was my only option.
As for Daisy, I hadn’t even got round to telling her I was in Islamabad because she had been so relieved when she learned that I hadn’t gone to New York. She must have wondered, though, why, when I called her every night, I would say I was in bed watching television.
I supposed I was going to have to tell her either tomorrow or the next day because on the Friday she was expecting to spend the weekend with me in London for her exeat. Mum and Dad said they would pick her up and were looking forward to seeing her again. Daisy loves nothing more than pottering around the garden and greenhouse with her granddad and playing with Spot the dog. I hate that dog, well not just that dog, any dog. Any animal that can lick its bottom then try and lick your face is disgusting in my book. I know Daisy’s angling for a puppy but hopefully she will grow out of it.
Anyway, that night I sent my news editor an email so he could go into conference on Tuesday morning fully informed of my plans for the week. I told him of my options. It read:
Hello boss. Went to Al Badr office – they’re the ones who have, according to Indian intelligence and CNN training videos, camps in Afghanistan and Kashmir. They want me to go to Lahore for a chat but they are not too hopeful. No Western journalists allowed in for two years. However, I feel they can be persuaded.
Then went to the Hazbul-Mujahdeen office. They also have training camps in Kashmir and are on the new terrorist lists. They insist they are freedom fighters and are keen to talk.
We (Pasha and I) have made friends with a young Mujahedin bloke who says he will escort and smooth our path. Basically if we do either of these routes we are talking at least a day out of Islamabad and if we are successful two days.
I then told him about the plan to go into Afghanistan and added:
In an ideal world we could probably do both options but this is Pakistan and the word rush or deadline have no meaning. It’s like pushing a pram against sludge.
I am up for either option but I will be guided by you. David Smith is in Peshawar at the moment and I filed about eight pars [paragraphs] on a Taliban conference for the Daily today – voluntarily offered just to keep them sweet because we are such nice people on the Sunday! Still no news of the Afghan visa – they now have 500 plus applications.
I heard about a woman who criticised my report in the letters page on Sunday. If she is so right why are people demonstrating and being shot, silly bint.
The last paragraph was in reference to a woman who had visited Pakistan and said in a letter to the paper that no one talked about the Taliban and everyone hated the movement. Apart from being paranoid, journalists can also be very sensitive souls with fragile egos, so if you want to get right up their noses send in a letter to their newspaper.
My email went on:
According to my man in London nothing will happen until the Pope has left and [Jack] Straw [the British Foreign Secretary] is back. Friday will probably be out because a strike would outrage the Muslims on their holy day and encourage people to say Bush is launching a crusade. Give my love to everyone, Yvonne.
I had been watching CNN before I sent my email and had seen images of the Pope John Paul II in Kazakhstan. He had chosen the region now facing potential war to make a special prayer for Christians and Muslims to live together without violence. The 81-year-old declared, ‘With all my heart, I beg God to keep the world in peace. We must not let what has happened lead to a deepening of divisions. Religion must never be used as a reason for conflict.’
They were very wise words from a very wise man but I felt that neither the White House nor Downing Street was listening, although a crowd of fifty thousand hung on to every single word as he spoke in Astana’s Central Mother of Homeland Square during a Mass.
It was quite surreal watching one of the world’s holiest men visiting Kazakhstan, a point where Europe meets Asia and Islam meets Christianity – a neighbour of Afghanistan, home to bin Laden. As the Pope prayed for peace the Western military build-up continued incongruously.
When I spoke to Jim later on he said he had mentioned my plans in conference and said they had been met with a couple of gasps and largely stunned silence. I simply retorted, ‘Well it’s either of those projects or I sit around and do nothing until the bombs drop and that ain’t gonna happen for a week to ten days.
‘Even if you’re happy for me to do that,’ I continued, ‘I’m not, because I’ll go stir crazy twiddling my thumbs over here. It’s a bit light on the old entertainment, although I have an open invitation to the UN Club, where they serve alcohol.
‘Have a good think about it. It’s only Tuesday and if I go in I’ll leave here tomorrow night. We’re just going to finalise details in the morning.’ He went off to have a further chat with the editor, Martin Townsend. I prayed they wouldn’t pull the job.
I was going to go to the
UN Club that night and have a few stiff drinks, but I really didn’t want to talk to anyone. I was trying to think about what I was doing and what the story was worth. Obviously, there was a risk element, but there’s a risk to everything you do. There’s a risk to crossing the road, there’s a risk to taking a cab, and, as a lot of people found out on 11 September, there’s a risk attached to going about trying to live a normal life. Mind you, a story’s not worth risking your life for because you simply won’t be around to tell it.
Just then the phone rang and it was one of my best pals, Julia Hartley Brewer, political correspondent of the Guardian – the one nicknamed GBH. She’s a sharing, caring soul and she wanted me to know that she was quaffing my favourite drink – champagne – in the company of the great and the not so great at the Highcliffe Hotel in Bournemouth, where she was covering the Lib Dem conference.
‘I know what you’re up to, you old slapper,’ she teased. ‘Sounds a bit risky to me, love. Anyway I know you’re somewhere you can’t have a decent drink, so I thought I’d have one for you.’ We had a good girlie natter and I told her the male tottie was really lacking round the hotel, but I had finally got rid of the ‘room service pest’ with the old tampon trick. She approved greatly and said she would speak to me later.
Less than thirty seconds later my phone went again and this time it was Tim Shipman, deputy political editor, obviously at a party, too. The things these political people have to do to bring in the news! I said hello and added, ‘I’ve just had your boss on the phone and she’s at some bloody champagne soirée and I’m stuck in a country where alcohol’s forbidden. Life’s not fair.’
Shippers, as he is known to his mates, chipped in: ‘I’m at the same party as GBH and she said she’d just spoken to you. You’re a totally mad woman. I love you to bits. Best of luck with your story.’
In the Hands of the Taliban Page 7