Committee to Protect Journalists Demands Immediate Release of Afghan Reporter Detained by US Immigration
The Committee to Protect Journalists has called for the immediate and unconditional release of Shabban Ali Rafat, an Afghan journalist, from detention by US immigration authorities. The committee warns that Rafat faces the threat of deportation to Afghanistan.
According to David Tarr, Rafat’s lawyer, he has been held in detention by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement in California since January 21, 2025, when he attempted to enter the United States to apply for asylum.
Jose Zamora, regional program director at the Committee to Protect Journalists in the US, stated that Rafat fled Afghanistan due to life-threatening risks stemming from his work as a journalist. Deporting him would mean handing him over to those he escaped from. He described Rafat’s prolonged detention as inconsistent with the US’s commitments to press freedom and human rights and urged US authorities to grant Rafat asylum.
Before the Taliban regained power in August 2021, Rafat worked as a producer and reporter for the state-run Aamozesh TV and served as a senior media officer at Kabul University. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, he extensively covered the 2020 terrorist attack on Kabul University and the situation of the Hazara community, to which he belongs.
The committee notes that since the Taliban’s return to power, the Hazara community has faced increasing harassment and violence. It reports that in 2026 alone, the Taliban shut down three Hazara-owned media outlets and detained their senior managers, actions the committee views as aimed at suppressing media and journalists from this community.
The Committee to Protect Journalists further stated that its emails sent to representatives of the Department of Homeland Security and US Immigration and Customs Enforcement seeking information about Rafat’s asylum application status have so far gone unanswered.
