Making movies the Afghan way

Cinema was banned under the Taliban, but film-makers are once again at work inside Afghanistan. Robert Fisk visits a set near Bagram

"....For incredibly, as Afghanistan sinks back into the anarchy which became its natural state these past 29 years, Afghan film-makers are producing movies of international quality, turning out pictures which prove – even amid war – that a country's tragedy can be imaginatively recreated for its people. Safaid Sang – Dari (Persian) for White Rock – was an Afghan refugee detention camp inside Iran whose Iranian guards helped to massacre more than 630 of their prisoners in 1998 after inmates protested at their treatment. The atrocity – largely unknown in the West – ended after two Iranian helicopters strafed the Afghans with machine guns. Quite a story. Quite a movie.....

In all, 630 Afghan prisoners – women as well as men -- are believed to have died in the original camp massacre, which lasted for six hours. Some of the prisoners managed to escape and hid in the mountains. Daoud Azimi was one of them and plays an Iranian police guard in the film. What does it feel like to wear the uniform of his oppressors? "I feel good," he says, "because I can actually show the world what they did."......"