"Beneath the Veil" redux

Documentary filmmaker Saira Shah returns to Afghanistan to find hopeful soldiers and starving children. Her film of the journey is called "Unholy War."

By Janelle Brown

Nov. 16, 2001 | "Beneath the Veil," an astonishing television documentary by British-Afghan filmmaker Saira Shah, was among the most influential documents to shape American perceptions of the Taliban in the days after Sept. 11. The film, which was in heavy rotation on CNN all through September, recorded grisly public executions, the underground activities of the RAWA feminist organization and the plight of three young Afghan girls whose mother had been murdered by the Taliban.

Shah traveled through Afghanistan last year, often undercover and always in great danger, to film "Beneath the Veil." She got out only after a brush with authorities that nearly led to the confiscation of her film -- a hair-raising experience that makes her decision to go back last month even more amazing. But Shah did not hesitate, as she watched the terrorist attacks unfold on the news, to begin planning another trip to Afghanistan, specifically to record the impact of the escalating conflict on the country's inhabitants, already the victims of terrible suffering. The documentary of Shah's recent trip, called "Unholy War," premieres Saturday on CNN.

The first time Shah visited Afghanistan, she drove across the border with the Taliban's grudging permission; this time, Shah had to use smugglers' routes through the Himalayas to reach Northern Alliance territory. Her goal: to follow the plight of the three girls she had met during her last visit, who were now "bang on the front line that was being militarized." En route, Shah spoke with Western aid workers, who were attempting to do their jobs with a war raging around them; with Northern Alliance soldiers determined to crush the Taliban; and with Afghan refugees in camps in Pakistan, whose fear of the Taliban was matched only by their fear of American bombs.

At its heart, "Unholy War" is the story of how Shah finds the three little girls featured in the first documentary living at the bloody edge of an international crisis. Shah spoke to Salon about her heartbreaking experience trying to offer aid to the traumatized family, and about what their tale forebodes for Afghanistan's future. As Shah puts it, "The girls really become a metaphor for Afghanistan, and how difficult it is to rebuild this country."

What had happened to the three girls in the year since you left?

They were in a very bad way; they were still very upset and traumatized [by their mother's death and the atrocities the Taliban inflicted upon them in the days afterward]. But we found that the new killer in their village was not the Taliban, it was the drought. The men of the village, who had told us before how their fathers and brothers had been shot in the hills by the Taliban, were now telling us about how young children were dying because the drought was so severe; and how one man had thrown himself in the river because he couldn't bear to look in his children's eyes because he couldn't feed them.

The three young girls were in a very similar situation: Their father had a little bit of land and their crops had failed, so there was very little for them to eat. Their father couldn't go out and try to find food because the girls were too frightenend to be left alone in the house -- not just because of fear of the Taliban, although they were very afraid that the Taliban would return, but fear that soldiers from any side would return, Northern Alliance included. They were stuck in their home with very little to eat in a hopeless situation.

It was very hard for me. When we did find them, we had to think how we could make their lives better: There's no point in turning up and then not being able to do anything for them. By their standards, we have lots of money; I thought, we can't rescue everyone in Afghanistan -- we saw desperate poverty along the way -- but I'm sure we can just help these three little girls.

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