Afghanistan closes videogame/film stores

[Guest Jobber of the Week]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=stor..._videogames_ban

 

Afghan City Closes Video Game Store

 

JALALABAD, Afhanistan - Authorities in Afghanistan (news - web sites)'s eastern city of Jalalabad on Tuesday closed hundreds of shops where children played video games and watched movies, accusing the merchants of "corrupting the morals" of young people, a senior police official said.

 

 

 

"We closed more than 300 shops," said Haji Ajab Shah, chief of Jalalabad police. "People would gamble and drink alcohol in those video game shops" despite prohibitions under Islam, the dominant faith in Afghanistan, he said.

 

 

Police were acting on orders issued late Monday by Mohammed Asif Qazizada, deputy governor of Nangarhar province. He said he was reacting to complaints from parents that their children spent time and money in the shops instead of going to their schools, Shah said.

 

 

Many of the video game shops were in basements of newly built shopping centers in Jalalabad, the provincial capital. Besides playing video games, customers watch DVD movies for a fee.

 

 

"The morals of the young people were corrupted there," Shah said. "Many things were done there that are forbidden by Islam."

 

 

The governor of eastern Nangarhar province, Din Mohammed, appointed by President Hamid Karzai, is a deeply conservative Muslim who espouses many of the interpretations of Islam that the Taliban followed.

 

 

The shops also were shut in December last year in a similar crackdown ordered by Afghanistan's Supreme Court chief judge, Fazal Hadi Shinwari, an orthodox Muslim who wants Sharia or Islamic law enforced in Pakistan.

 

 

But they were allowed to reopen after promising to bar children under 16, Shah said.

 

 

Shinwari also ordered a ban on cable television for allegedly violating Islamic moral codes.

 

 

The hardline policies appealed to conservative elements in Afghanistan's post-Taliban government, which appears to be holding increasing sway.

 

 

Before it was ousted by a U.S.-led coalition in 2001, the radical Taliban militia banned television and other forms of entertainment such as music and movies.

 

Nice to see all that cultural facism of the Taliban be left behind, huh? What a dandy we were, liberating them and all that!

[Guest Phr33k]

It's their religion. If the Islamic faith prohibits drinking and gambling, so be it.

 

The Americans liberated the Afghanis from a government that tortured, beat and raped the citizens, to put it mildly. They didn't liberate them from Islamic faith.

[Guest Jobber of the Week]

The Americans liberated the Afghanis from a government that tortured, beat and raped the citizens, to put it mildly. They didn't liberate them from Islamic faith.

No, but one of the benefits I assumed would come from "liberating" countries is that they'd be free from theocratic law.

 

Please do not make me rant about theocracies again and how crazy they are. Surely you've read one of my past rants on the subject?

[Guest Vern Gagne]

This is only in one city. We really don't know what's going on in the other parts of the country. Also, it was mentioned this happened before. The arcade was allowed to reopen. This might be a case of two strikes and your out, or down the line they'll reopen it with some restrictions. Maybe a parent, or adult have to accomplish the child. They aren't open during school hours.