Five months of Pakistani journalist in Jalalabad prison - XIII
Faizullah Khan was detained by Afghan authorities in eastern Nangarhar province in April 2014.
Part - 13: (Intriguing account of a Pakistani journalist captured in Afghanistan for interview of Taliban leadership)
Read Part - 12 here: Five months of Pakistani journalist in Jalalabad prison – XII
As I entered my cell after the interrogation, Hazrat Ameen asked me, “ Did they tortured you?” He was quite concerned about this. My days and nights spend in the jail were alike. One afternoon, the window of my cell opened sometime before lunch. It was an unusual thing. I saw that an Afghan who was locked with me before was carrying a cup filled with buttermilk with coriander or mint spread on top of it. He offered it to me.
In a surprising reaction I asked him, “How did you get this and who gave it to you?”
All inmates in the cell use to pray in congregation. After the end of every Maghrib prayer, prisoners use to recite Holy Quran and Maulana Waliullah then pray at completion. At one hand, prisoners prayed for their release whereas on the other hand they curse the Afghan officials.
“Drink it and don’t ask questions,” he replied to me. Later, I got to know that it was his last day in the jail. He was sent to intelligence office for cleaning the lounge and on his return they gave him buttermilk’s bottle which he distributed among all the prisoners.
All inmates in the cell use to pray in congregation. After the end of every Maghrib prayer, prisoners use to recite Holy Quran and Maulana Waliullah then pray at completion. At one hand, prisoners prayed for their release whereas on the other hand they curse the Afghan officials.
During all this, one more prisoner was added in the cell who was called Engineer by the other inmates. He belonged to Hizb-e-Islami and was a sugar patient. Instead of keeping him in a cell, he was held in a small lounge between two cells. It turned out later that he was detained personally by Nangarhar’s intelligence chief. A brother of Engineer was working with Taliban and shortly before the intelligence chief’s close relative was kidnapped by the Afghan Taliban. After failed negotiations, the chief arrested Engineer and held him here so that he can liberate his own relative. Later the matter was settled and Taliban not only released their own people but also attained million of rupees in exchange.
“You will not be chained today. There is someone to meet you.” I was shocked to hear his words. He signaled me to move outside the cell where an Afghan was standing. He shook hands with me and then led me outside the jail.
All the inmates living in the cell were very intimate with one another but at times they regard each other with suspicion that maybe a spy of Afghan officials was present within them. The prisoners were more closely attached with Pakistani inmates because they were sure that Pakistanis will not indulge in spying for the Afghans.
From time to time, voices of Quran’s recitation, prayers and poetry use to come from various cells through which the prisoners get rid of boredom. It was my tenth day in the prison which I evaluated by drawing lines on the cells’s walls.
It was 11am when the cell’s door opened unexpectedly. The Afghan official asked me to step out. I stood up and went out and put forward both my hands in front of him in a robotic manner. It was mandatory to be handcuffed before going out of the jail. But the official reacted in contrary to this and said, “You will not get chained today. There is someone to meet you.” I was shocked to hear his words. He signaled me to move outside the cell where an Afghan was standing. He shook hands with me and then led me outside the jail.
In a state of confusion and awe I followed him with still thinking that why I was taken out without being handcuffed.
Read the Urdu version here: Five months in Jalalabad prison
