MINI SERIES: NOTHING IS APOLITICAL

Afghan journalist Zahra Joya — founder of Rukhshana Media, TIME Woman of the Year, and author of the new memoir The Vanishing Girl of Kabul — on what it really takes to report the truth under Taliban rule, and the price of fighting for the most basic human rights.

In Part 1 of this episode of Beyond Borders Podcast, host Aakriti Dhawan sits down with Zahra to trace her journey from a tiny Hazara village to running one of Afghanistan's most important newsrooms in exile.

Growing up in her Hazara community, Zahra had to pretend to be a boy named Mohammed just to go to school. She shares the weight of carrying that secret, her journey from dreaming of becoming a lawyer to becoming a journalist, and the discrimination that  ...