Taliban launches women’s magazine

THE Pakistani Taliban has released the first edition of a new women’s magazine, with articles celebrating the role of mothers in jihad and calling on “like-minded” sisters to “get together” and learn new skills – including how to use a grenade.

The 45-page publication seeks to draw support from a section of society traditionally scorned by the jihadist group. “We want to provoke women of Islam to come forward and join the ranks of mujahideen,” reads an opening editorial in the magazine, which is titled Sunnat E Khaula, or The Way of Khaula, in honour of a female Muslim warrior from the 7th century.

Some features mimic the traditional format of a women’s magazine. A cover image depicts a woman, albeit facing away from the camera and dressed in a burka from head to toe. Further into the publication, an advice column implores readers to “organise secret get-togethers at home”, arrange “physical training classes for sisters” and “learn how to use simple weapons”. The digitally distributed Sunnat E Khaula also boasts the equivalent of a “celebrity interview”, with a question-and-answer section with the wife of Mullah Fazlullah, the Taliban leader, who has never been heard from in public before.

“It’s like an editor wants to start his first issue with a big scoop,” says Sami Yousafzai, a Pakistani journalist who specialises in militancy. “I ask you why now everywhere there is hue and cry about under age marriages,” Mr Fazlullah’s wife tells an interviewer, revealing she was married at the age of 14.

“We have to understand that mature boys and girls if left unmarried for too long can become a source of moral destruction.”

The magazine represents an attempt by the Taliban to “grab attention” again, says Imtiaz Gul, of the Centre for Research and Security Studies, after a draining series of defeats on the battlefield.