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Afghan forces killed 10 fighters who claimed to be part of Islamic State on Sunday

growing numbers of disgruntled Taliban fighters have joined the militant group that has seized swathes of territory in Syria and Iraq

significance is not so much a function of its intrinsic capacities in the area but of its potential to offer an alternative flagpole to which otherwise isolated insurgent splinter groups can rall

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's latest report to the Security Council on Afghanistan said a handful of Taliban commanders had declared allegiance to Islamic State and that an increasing number were seeking funding or cooperation with Islamic State.

The radical Islamist group has declared a caliphate in the territory it controls in Syria and Iraq. A U.S.-led alliance has been targeting Islamic State with air strikes in Iraq and Syria for some six month

Militants loyal to Islamic State have also been exploiting chaos in Libya, while Boko Haram, which is seeking to carve an Islamist emirate out of northeastern Nigeria, has pledged its allegiance to Islamic State

"an alignment of circumstances that could be conducive to fostering peace talks" between the Afghan government and the Taliban. Officials said last month the Afghan Taliban has signaled it is willing to open peace talks.

continues a frank dialogue with the Taliban on humanitarian access and on human right

Those from the west are naive and lack imagination, they are chasing a fictional dream, and they often have barely any knowledge of what Islam is.”

The book aspiring Isis militants most commonly ordered online before taking off to Syria was Islam for Dummies, she said.

“What Isis has done, and they have exceed al-Qaida in this, is take really spectacular control of the narrative of their organisation while sharing that story through masterful use of all mechanisms of the media,” she said

propaganda and recruitment videos spreading the jihadi message w

Ten years ago, it was difficult to access and acquire videos like the beheadings we have seen unless you were part of an inner circle, but now this material is mainstream, you can access it just by opening Twitter,”

“If you are a young person with limited imagination, a limited sense of self, and you are uninclined to engage with your neighbours, friends and a pluralistic society, you are very easily seduced. You’re like a blank canvas.”

Differentiating between Islam and Islamism

Islamism promotes explicit totalitarianism and the belief that Islam historically had incredible global and geopolitical glory that should be restored through violence, jihadism and barbarity

The Taliban has already been successful with this approach on other fronts. Their attacks on polio aid workers have proven effective in disrupting the country’s entire public health system

Together with Jishnu Das of the World Bank, we have been researching Pakistan’s education sector for nearly 20 years.

Girls in particular have benefited from this school boom: more are in school than ever.

Research shows that the education debate in Pakistan is similar to the education debate in any other country: parents grapple with a choice of schools based on the usual set of considerations: Which of the schools nearby is best? How much should we pay? Is our child getting the best quality education?

But education is a unique service – not only because it involves a country’s most precious resource, its children – but also because, by increasing human capital, it strengthens the state not only in the present, but in the future.

As we speak, many schools are announcing temporary closure of facilities in the aftermath of the latest attack

In Africa and South Asia for example, boys remain 1.55 times more likely to complete secondary education than girls, according to World Bank data.

Even when girls make it into the classroom they still “continue to face particular risk in chaotic conflict settings,”

n Pakistan, for example, the Taliban has declared war on girls' education, and frequently attacks educational institutions

“They don’t translate into greater equality in the labor market,” said Sarah Gammage, director of gender, economic empowerment and livelihoods at the International Center for Research on Women. “Around the world women have disproportionately been part of the informal economy.”

hey are typically responsible for providing care services for family members, Gammage said. Other duties include child rearing, cooking, and other household chores. It is work for which they are not paid. Women perform three times more unpaid work than men, according to the U.N.’s 2015 Human Development Report.

eing able to make decisions, such as voting, owning land, and deciding whom to marry “is where we see the most significant difference between the least developed and developed countries,” said Varia.

In Saudi Arabia, women are not permitted to drive and cannot open bank accounts without their husbands' permissio

Uganda forbids women to gain permanent custody of children after a divorce,

Honor killings, the traditional practice that allows the slaying of a family member who is believed to have brought dishonor on a family, claims thousands of women’s lives every year in South and Central Asia.