Kash Kidnapped

KASH KIDNAPPED, a revealing journey to Afghanistan, is a detailed account of Kash Gabriele Torsello’s 23 days of imprisonment in Helmand – his brief conversations with his kidnappers, his thoughts, his emotions and his liberation – that also acts as a revealing portrait of Afghanistan and its people.

 

The author, after a long period of reflection – and of silence – tells for the first time the entire story of his kidnapping, recounting not only his captivity but also the key moments that preceded his capture and that, according to Torsello, reveal the motives and the people behind his kidnapping.

 

The book charts Torsello’s story from 2001, when the young journalist regularly visited the Taliban’s headquarters, to 2006 when he was transported for eight hours in the boot of a car, hooded and chained, and finally to his release into the hands of the Italian NGO, Emergency.

 

The book contains never before published photos that Gabriele managed to save before his kidnapping. He was the first journalist to visit and photograph the ghost town Musa Qala, although many of these images were later seized by his kidnappers: in the book, the town is visualized instead through words. 

 

KASH KIDNAPPED provides a revealing and fascinating portrait of Afghanistan through a series of travel notes and encounters by an Italian man dressed, but not disguised, as a local. Gabriele travels deep into Afghanistan, identifying the historical and cultural differences, and the similarities, between Western and Middle Eastern culture – while also discovering much about himself.