Two different images are going viral on social media while Clarissa Ward, a female reporter with the United States (US) broadcaster Cable News Network (CNN), was reporting in Kabul, sparking an argument that the female reporter’s clothes also changed after the Taliban took over.
According to the details, a picture of Clarissa Ward, chief international correspondent for CNN, was taken from inside a compound in Kabul on August 15, 2021, when the Taliban had not yet entered the Afghan capital.
On the other hand, the second photo is of August 16, 2021, in which the female reporter can be seen in a burqa. This was the time when the Taliban had taken over the country and President Ashraf Ghani had left the country.
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According to the Associated Press (AP), some social media users were trying to create the impression that the situation had changed dramatically before and after the Taliban took over by sharing the two photos of the female reporter together.
However, the female reporter had to come to the field herself and she explained both sides of her picture saying that both her pictures were being misrepresented and termed the meme as ‘inaccurate’.
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On her official Twitter handle, Ward said, “The top photo is inside a private compound. The bottom is on the streets of Taliban held Kabul. I always wore a head scarf on the street in Kabul previously, though not w/hair fully covered and abbaya.”
This meme is inaccurate. The top photo is inside a private compound. The bottom is on the streets of Taliban held Kabul. I always wore a head scarf on the street in Kabul previously, though not w/ hair fully covered and abbaya. So there is a difference but not quite this stark. pic.twitter.com/BmIRFFSdSE
— Clarissa Ward (@clarissaward) August 16, 2021
“So there is a difference but not quite this stark,” she added. Ward explained that in the past, she used to cover her head when she went out to report on the streets of Kabul, but did not wear a burqa.
According to the female journalist, the conclusions being drawn from her photo are not like that. The picture in the burqa of Clarissa Ward is being discussed at a time when the Taliban have offered women to join the government.
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Taliban spokesperson Zabehulah Mujahid said, in a press conference yesterday, that women’s rights would be respected under Islamic law, but did not elaborate.
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