WRFI’s The Scene Interviews Tawab Danish on Exile from Afghanistan

By Chantal Thomas | September 9, 2022

Today’s episode of The Scene features an interview with Tawab Danish, a professor of human rights and constitutional law from Afghanistan, where he lived until the 2021 withdrawal of US forces and the subsequent takeover of the country by the Taliban. With his wife and three young sons, Professor Danish arrived in the US in July of 2022. Professor Danish discusses the vision of constitutional democracy that he had worked towards in Afghanistan, and the multiple reasons why that vision has so far proved illusory.

Professor Danish, a visiting scholar at Cornell Law School, also recounts chilling moments of personal and communal upheaval brought about by the Taliban’s seizure of power. In describing the challenges faced by his family in exile, he also emphasized the crucial assistance provided by the local community organizations Ithaca Welcomes Refugees and Catholic Charities.

Listen to the episode here.

Read more about the 2021 US withdrawal from Afghanistan, and the history of its interventions there, in this report, “Afghanistan’s Present Failure Lies in its Past Design,” from the Middle East Research and Information Project (January 2022).

British and Afghan officials at the signing of the Treaty of Gandamak (Major Cavagnari second from left, Amir Yakub Khan in the center), May 1879. Photo by John Burke, public domain, British Library. Published with Bejamin D. Hopkins, “Afghanistan’s Present Failures Lies in its Past Design” (MERIP, 2022).

The Scene airs every other Friday at 10am on WRFI. Find past episodes here.

Posted in The Scene