Worried about whether Islamic verses on Facebook are allowed? Or that suicide bombers kill innocent civilians? Afghanistan's Taliban have set up a new question-and-answer section on their website to address such issues. The facility on Voice of Jihad, the official website of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan - the Taliban's own name for their movement - allows readers to submit queries to spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid.
It is a demonstration of how far the insurgents' attitude towards technology has changed. When they were in power the Taliban made televisions illegal on the grounds that they showed un-Islamic programmes, even hanging sets from trees using video tape. But now they have embraced social media and even have a Twitter account - as does the Nato-led International Security Assistance Force, with spokesmen on occasion arguing with each other online.
Last month Maulavi Qalamuddin, former chief of the Taliban's "vice and virtue" squad, which whipped women without burqas and jailed men without beards, told AFP that he had two televisions in his house. The Voice of Jihad site is packed with denunciations of the Kabul government as "slaves" or "puppets" of its Western allies - "infidels" and "enemies of Islam" - and often exaggerated claims of successes in the bloody, decade-long insurgency.
The answers have a consistent linguistic style and appear to be written by one person, who reveals himself to be married, middle-aged, and likes all types of halal food, declining to give more personal details for security reasons. Most of the inquiries appear to come from Taliban supporters and often praise the militants, sometimes wishing them success in "the holy war against the crusaders".
But a poster giving his name as Haseeb Ul Rahman asked: "Don't you think that killing all these people in suicide and bomb attacks every day is a big sin? Who do you think will be held responsible by Allah?" More than 3,000 civilians died in the Afghanistan conflict last year, more than three-quarters of them killed by the Taliban or other insurgent groups, according to the United Nations.
Mujahid blamed "technical problems" for such deaths. "I agree killing civilians by anyone is not acceptable at all, but let's remember that there are times when civilians get killed and there are times when it is not true but the enemy's propaganda," he said. "It is a fact that civilians get killed during the enemy's operations. I can tell you with confidence that civilians are not deliberately killed by the mujahideen (Taliban fighters), rather it happens because of technical problems or missing the targets."Attempts are being made to start negotiations to end the conflict as foreign combat troops prepare to leave in 2014.
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