In an interview with the BBC the day after the arrests on 20 January, Suhai Shaheen, who hopes to become the Taliban’s ambassador to the UN, said: “If [the Taliban] had detained them, they would say they have detained them, and if that is the allegation they will go to court and they will defend themselves… This is something legal, but if they are not detained, and they are making such fake scenes and shooting films in order to seek asylum abroad.”
