A reporter orphaned by night raids in Afghanistan investigates their cruel legacy

Lynzy Billing’s sister and mother were killed in 1992 when, amid the Afghan civil war, her home was raided by soldiers in the night. Orphaned when her father also died in the war, Billing was adopted, eventually settled in Britain and later returned to Afghanistan as an investigative journalist. Based on a 2019 article by Billing, this animated short documents how nighttime raids proliferated in Afghanistan following the US invasion of the country in 2001, even as the tactic became controversial for killing hundreds of Afghan civilians. The result of more than three years of investigations by Billing, the film profiles both local perpetrators and victims of these US-backed raids, and finds a still-flowing river of tragedy and trauma in their wake.