Burqa-clad ‘ISIL militants’ turn out to be lovers in disguise in southeast Turkey

MARDİN

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Two men detained as suspected jihadists in the southeastern province of Mardin were actually wearing burqas to disguise themselves in order to visit their girlfriends secretly, police have found.

According to a Jan. 21 statement issued by the Mardin Governor’s Office, the two burqa-clad men, identified only by their initials M.D. and Z.T., were detained by police as suspected Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militants.

The two were “unmasked” after a motorized police team noticed that one of the burqa-clad “women” was actually wearing men’s shoes, Doğan News Agency reported. Security forces took the suspects to a nearby police station as a precaution against a possible lynch attempt after a local crowd had gathered.

“The investigation has revealed that the men were wearing burqas to hide their love affairs,” the Mardin Governor’s Office stated. Doğan News Agency reported that the men had resorted to the burqa disguise in order to clandestinely visit their girlfriends, whose families oppose their relationships.
The emergence of ISIL in Syria and Iraq has raised social tension and security concerns in Turkey’s southeast, where many are worried about locals crossing the border to join the jihadists.

Beards, which have actually been popularized throughout Turkey in recent years thanks to their adoption by a number of TV stars and footballers, are sometimes reported as a problem in the southeast of the country nowadays. It was reported in October 2014 that barbers in the southeastern province of Diyarbakır had been receiving increased demands to shave off the beards of customers worried about being labelled jihadists.


DHA photo