17 July 2013

The Taliban's letter to Malala is a sign of their failure

The letter sent by a senior figure in the Pakistan Taliban to Malala Yousafzai setting out the case against her is an extraordinary document by any standards. It is an attempt to defend the indefensible – the attempted assassination of a 15-year-old schoolgirl.

In it, Adnan Rasheed deploys all the arguments he can think of, referencing Henry Kissinger (a Jew, he helpfully points out) and quoting Bertrand Russell on the way modern science might be manipulated – via diet and injections – to control populations.

His letter complains that she is pushing UN propaganda, of promoting an education system that has no place for Islam and it wonders whether there would have been such an outcry if she had been injured in a US drone strike. [telegraph.co.uk] Read more