“I am here to take you to the airport”
In today’s Washington Post, freelance reporter Nicholas Schmidle talks about the dangers of reporting from Pakistan and how he was forced to leave,
The police came for me on a cold, rainy Tuesday night last month. They stood in front of my home in Islamabad, four men with hoods pulled over their heads in the driving rain. The senior officer, a tall, clean-shaven man, and I recognized one another from recent protests and demonstrations. Awkwardly, almost apologetically, he handed me a notice ordering my immediate expulsion from Pakistan…. For the first time in two years, I feared for our safety. The next morning, we bought two one-way tickets back to the States. Within two days, we had pawned off out cat and packed or sold the rest of our belongings. link