As described in a Hollywood Reporter article about Sharyn Alfonsi's 2021 trip to Afghanistan for a "60 Minutes" segment, a coveted interview with a Taliban minister looked like it was about to finally happen — until it nearly didn't.
While arranging the Taliban interview was complex enough, Alfonsi explained that just getting into the country wasn't easy either, saying, "We didn't know if they were going to let us in or not, it was a little bit of a gamble." Then there was the convoluted process of organizing a meeting with any of the notoriously camera-shy Taliban officials. "We used a third party who was helping us to get in touch with them, and it was on and off," Alfonsi said, adding that even once a meeting was set up, there was no guarantee any of the Taliban would agree to be filmed. Even after an hour of negotiating over his appearance on-camera, the minister tried to repeatedly stop the shoot. "But he ultimately kept going," Alfonsi said.
Alfonsi also recalled that she and her crew were then unexpectedly invited to eat with Taliban leaders in the basement after the interview. But she noted that her crew still had their guard up, adding, "We made sure we had the media of our interview in our pockets, on us physically. We didn't want them to take the interview."
