On the evening of March 10, 1999, I was on a bus destined for Kandahar. In Chakab (two kilometers to Delaram in the province of Farah) at 10:30 we heard shots being fired and then the bus stopped. We realized that the driver and one of the passengers had been shot. Then, eight armed people who were wearing black turbans and loose Talib-style clothes surrounded us and started cursing at us vulgarly.

They asked the driver, who was a young man, for some money; but he told them that he did not have any and that he had left the money in Herat at the bus station. The armed bandits, however, did not accept this and threw him out of the bus and, while already shot and injured, aimed at his chest and shot him again. The driver's father, who was on the bus too, started shouting, "Take this money and leave my son alone." The bandit Talibs, after taking the money, started beating up the passengers savagely. (There were 19 passengers on the bus out of which 14 were ethnic Hazrahs who had been deported by the Iranian regime.) After they robbed the passengers of all their money and valuables, they left us alone and fled the scene.

Around twenty minutes later, another bus arrived and, upon our request, took the injured to transfer to a hospital. The rest decided to stay in Delaram for the night. Since I was the only one who could drive, I drove the bus the next day toward Kandahar. When we reached Kandahar in the afternoon, we learned from the driver's friends that he had died at the hospital a few hours after the incident. All the passengers were infuriated by the news and started expressing their hatred for the fascist Talibs.

-- Neman