New York Times reporter Matthew Rosenberg has just been given 24 hours to leave Afghanistan after the paper published an article Monday that discloses the country may impose an interim government.
Rosenberg joined HuffPost Live for an exclusive interview about why he was asked to leave and how he received the expulsion order, which happened just 10 minutes before host Alyona Minkovski interviewed him.
"They came to our door, the police with AK47s and three civilian officials who all decided they would film the event of my colleague ... who went outside taking possession of the expulsion order," Rosenberg said.
A spokesman for President Hamid Karzai confirmed that the president and several other players "at the very highest level" were part of the decision to issue the expulsion order. However, Rosenberg said his team is now working on translating the documents because they question the legality of the order, which didn't follow any court proceedings.
"We want to comply, we want to cooperate with Afghan authorities, but we're asking them to respect Afghanistan's due process," Rosenberg said.
The reporter hasn't made up his mind about whether he will in fact leave the country within 24 hours.
"We're exploring our options, certainly discussing what we do next," he said. "I mean, look, I'm definitely getting packed because you gotta pack up, I've got half a life here. But right now, I think we're just trying to figure out what comes next."
Afghanistan has gone back and forth about how to handle the Rosenberg. Initially, officials barred him from leaving the country, but now they demand he leave within one day.
Watch the full interview with Matthew Rosenberg here.
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