New issue of satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo went on sale today
- It sold out in some newsstand kiosks within minutes of them opening
- One Twitter user reported queues at a news kiosk at 5.45am
- The latest cover features a caricature of a weeping prophet Mohammed
- It is on newsstands one week after gunmen murdered editorial staff
- It normally sells 30,000 copies – today’s print run is five million
- Copies of the magazine are selling for three figures on auction site eBay
- Yemen’s al Qaeda branch claimed responsibility for Paris massacre
Charlie Hebdo resurrected its irreverent and often provocative newspaper today, featuring a caricature of the prophet Mohammed on the cover.
The magazine, which normally sells around 30,000 copies a week, had an initial unprecedented print run of three million. This has been increased to five million after copies were snapped up today.
Issues of the magazine had sold out across Paris news kiosks this morning within minutes.
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Clamour: The latest issue of Charlie Hebdo, produced one week after many of its editorial staff were murdered, reportedly sold out across France within minutes
A man buys a copy of Charlie Hebdo newspaper at a newsstand in Rennes, western France
The latest issue maintained the intentionally offensive tone that made the newspaper famous in France
Twitter user Eric Randolph wrote: ‘My local had a queue of 70 people waiting at 5.45am.’
‘The queues have stretched everywhere, but lots and lots of people are disappointed,’ said Michel Blanchet, who runs a kiosk near the Gare de l’Est station.
A handful of magazines are expected to be available in the UK by the end of the week, but British eBay users are bidding three-figure sums, such is the eagerness for the survivors’ edition.
The latest cover shows a weeping Mohammed, holding a sign reading ‘I am Charlie’ with the words ‘All is forgiven’ above him.
It is appearing on newsstands one week to the day after the assault in Paris by two masked gunmen that killed eight members of the Charlie Hebdo staff, including its editor and three other cartoonists, along with two police officers.
They said they were wreaking vengeance for the magazine’s blasphemous cartoons and jokes about figures sacred to Islam.
One killer shouted ‘Charlie Hebdo is dead!’ following the massacre.
A top leader of Yemen’s al Qaida branch has claimed responsibility for the attack.
Nasr al-Ansi, a commander of Al Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, or AQAP as the branch is known, appeared in an 11-minute internet video, saying that the massacre at Charlie Hebdo was in ‘vengeance for the prophet’.
Al-Ansi said France belongs to the ‘party of Satan’ and warned of more ‘tragedies and terror’. He said Yemen’s al Qaida branch ‘chose the target, laid out the plan and financed the operation’.
The latest issue of Charlie Hebdo maintained the intentionally offensive tone that made the newspaper famous in France.
The first two pages include drawings by the slain cartoonists: One shows a well-known late French nun talking about oral sex; another shows Muslim, Christian and Jewish leaders dividing up the world.
The lead editorial lays out a vigorous defense of secularism, and of the newspaper’s right to lampoon religions and hold their leaders accountable – and ends with a critique of the Pope.
‘For the past week, Charlie, an atheist newspaper, has achieved more miracles than all the saints and prophets combined.
Commuters queue to buy the new edition of Charlie Hebdo at Gare de Lyon train station in Paris
‘The one we are most proud of is that you have in your hands the newspaper that we always made,’ it reads.
It also includes a drawing of Isis leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, with a message wishing him good health, penned by murdered cartoonist Georges Wolinski.
This picture was the last tweet by the magazine before the attack.
Elsewhere readers will find doodles by the magazine’s editor, Charb, and a cartoon showing two terrorists ascending to heaven.
One, puzzled, asks where all the virgins are that they were promised. In the background the slain staff members are seen on a cloud having sex with multiple women.
Expensive: Bidding for one copy has already surpassed £500 with more than 15 hours until the item expires
Demand: Another copy of the new edition, featuring the Prophet Muhammad on the front cover, reached £409
Watch: How I created the Charlie Hebdo magazine cover
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