Poets, diamond merchants and millionaires

It's not terrorists and Muslim extremists the US is fighting in Afghanistan. Oh no, these people are peaceful. Poets and/or professionals.

The brothers, both journalists and part-time gemstone dealers, said they had been arrested on false accusations from political rivals.

They denied any contacts with either the Taleban regime or al-Qaeda.

"Although we did not have any links with the Taleban we did support them in our writings," said Badar.

Hilarious. And it gets better. Under the subparagraph of "Prolific writer", the BBC continues:

In detention he kept his sanity by writing poems. In his first months of confinement, Abdul Rahim's poetry was full of despair.

At first, deprived of paper and pen, he memorised his best lines or scribbled them secretly on paper cups.

He recited a verse: "What kind of spring is this where there are no flowers and the air is filled with a miserable smell?"

This just after they write:

Abdul Rahim said he had once been a member of Afghan rebel leader Gulbuddin Hekmatyar's Hizb-e Islami party, but severed ties to the group.

Or so he says anyway.

Journalists, both of them. Part-time gemstone dealers. Poets and family men.

What a tragedy.