Press freedom is one of the important achievements of the past ten years of current government of Afghanistan, which has been obtained with the involvement and support of the international community. Now that the gradual withdrawal of the international troops are speeding up and the talks with the Taliban, who from the roots of their believe are against the freedom of speech and media activities, is getting serious, it puts the press freedom in an awkward position and uncertain future.

The number of mass media is growing remarkably every year. Most of these media are dependent on the international donor funding in one way or another. The Afghan minister of Information and Culture, Sayed Makhdoom Raheen expresses concerns over the closure of a considerable number of internationally funded media organizations after the withdrawal of foreign troops in 2014. 

Ten years after the involvement and presence of international community in Afghanistan, the deadly incidents and violations against reporters and media personnel are about the same as it was in the first years of post Taliban. Media activists in Afghanistan still face serious challenges.

Based on Afghanistan Journalist Center (AfJC) database, only in 2011 four reporters have been killed in Urozgan, Herat, Laghman and Kabul provinces. The reports indicate that an ISAF soldier killed the reporter in Trinkot city, while the mine explosions in Herat and Mehtarlam cities caused the death of two reporters and the fourth death was as a result of a rocket launcher attack in Kabul city.

With inclusion of these four reporters, the death toll of media personnel since 2001 reached 31 reporters, 17 of who are Afghans. 
In addition to these deadly incidents, numerous accounts of beating, torture and physical violations against reporters have been recorded in different provinces of Afghanistan. According to Afghanistan media watchdog report in 2011, violations against reporters rose 38 percent in comparison to one year before. 

Self censorship due to pressure and threats of influential government officials, shortfall in covering broader corruption and human rights violations in Afghanistan due to the presence of a considerable number of accused people in important and key posts in central and provincial government department, and in most cases the realities have not been reported to the public because of the fear and pressure of the above said people.
Avoiding the provision of information by the government officials and not telling the truth about the Kabul Bank case, and of course the role of high ranking government officials and their relatives in embezzlement and bankruptcy of this bank as well as the government land seizure cases have blocked the way in reporting the truth to the people.

The reporters in Northern Afghanistan also consider the corruption and government land seizure the two important factors that are not easy to report on. According to northern media personnel, whenever any reporters have made efforts in covering these topics, they have faced serious difficulties. According to Mazar-e Sharif based, House of Reporters information, one of their Faryab based reporters was threatened by Faryab police for covering "the illegal Passport Sell" story.

In the South, where most fighting and security related incidents took place in the past year, in addition to facing sever security threats reporters barely managed to report about the land seizure and corruption as well as the involvement of government officials and tribal leaders in drug smuggling. The same problem exists in Herat, which is an important province in the west of Afghanistan.

Herat, an important economical and business province of Afghanistan has had considerable improvements and brought in remarkable income into central government's treasury. However, the hidden and apparent clashes of local dominant persons in getting the high rank government positions have proven challenging to the reporters. The reporters have barely dared to cover such clashes because of the pressure, threat and warnings of the involved parties.

An example of the level of threat to media personnel and programs can be best observed in local television station "Asia", in which the manager became obliged to close its "watchdog" program that observed the role of different political parties and their ties with Iran in the Afghan power struggle.

Unprofessional Reporting:
The number of partisan, ethnic and ideology based media organizations, providing biased and sensational reports, are increasing in the country.
While Afghanistan is facing the economical, security and various types of crisis, most of these media have tried to provide reports and information that only benefit the political, economical and ideological goals of their own or that of their supporters. They have tried to contaminate the channel of information flow.

The selective reporting on the fuel tankers blockade by Iran, which skyrocketed the fuel price; presence of international troops and the strategic treaty between Afghanistan and the USA are the example of such biased and unprofessional reporting, which were solely aimed at misleading the public thoughts.

The scandal of "Emroz" and "Tamadon" televisions on religious matters, which later involved other religious, think tank and media, is another instance of unprofessional reporting.
Lack of work security and insurance:
Despite the considerable increase of media organizations in the past ten years or so, reporters still don't have the work security and insurance.

Generally, the work contracts are unjust and biased in favor of the media organizations. Reporters and other media personnel are hired for low salaries. The work insurance is almost non-existence.
The role of government and anti-government armed forces:
The Afghan government has continuously bragged that it believes in the press freedom and supports it. However, as observed to date, such claims have not come from the roots of the system, but rather from the individual persons.

While the right to access information is guaranteed in article 50 of the Afghan constitution and article 5 of the media law, the Afghan government either did not manage or did not want to implement these articles.

A number of high ranking government officials in central and provincial departments have repeatedly refused to provide information to reporters. Reporters and media activists are being arrested by governments for no obvious reasons. The anti government armed forces also threaten reporters for coverage of events that do not reflect their goals and agendas.

In such a critical situation that media activities in Afghanistan are facing an increase in challenges and problems, the talks with Taliban, who refuse the Afghan constitution and have no believe in press freedom or freedom of civil society, have added to the concerns of media activists over the vague future of media and press freedom in Afghanistan.