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| Radical preacher Anjem Choudary |
Radical London preacher Anjem Choudary, who previously called for gay people to be stoned to death, has been jailed for five years on terror charges after allegedly encouraging support for ISIS.
The hardline Islamic preacher is the former UK head of the Islamist group al-Muhajiroun or Islam4UK, which was banned in the UK in 2010.
He suggested at a press conference in 2009 that gay people should be stoned to death, and has maintained that stance since.
Choudary, who frequently causes controversy with his extremist views and high-profile protests, had faced charges under terrorism laws for calling on social media for people to support ISIS.
He was charged alongside Mohammed Rahman, 32, of Whitechapel, east London, with one offence under section 12 of the Terrorism Act 2000, which bans people from “inviting support for a proscribed organisation”.
Today, Mr Choudary was jailed for five and a half years after backing the group in an oath of allegiance published online.
Justice Holroyde sentenced him during the trial at the Old Bailey.
The preacher is known for his extreme anti-gay views.
He claimed in a Fox News interview last year that he thought those found guilty of “sodomy”, where there are four witnesses, should be stoned to death under Sharia law, which he said should be implemented worldwide.
Source: Pink News, Nick Duffy, September 6, 2016
Radical preacher Anjem Choudary jailed for five years
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| ISIS terrorists throw a gay man off a building top in Iraq in November 2015 |
The 49-year-old was convicted at the Old Bailey after backing the group in an oath of allegiance published online.
Police say Choudary's followers have carried attacks in the UK and abroad.
The judge, who described Choudary as calculating and dangerous, passed the same sentence on his confidant Mohammed Mizanur Rahman, 33.
The trial heard the pair also used speeches to urge support for IS after it declared a caliphate in the summer of 2014.
Choudary, of Ilford, east London, and Rahman, from Palmers Green, north London, were convicted last month of inviting support for IS - an offence contrary to section 12 of the Terrorism Act 2000 - between 29 June 2014 and 6 March 2015.
Counter-terrorism chiefs blame the preacher and the proscribed organisations which he helped to run, such as al-Muhajiroun, for radicalising young men and women including the killers of soldier Lee Rigby in 2013.
But they said they had been unable to act for many years as he had stayed "just within the law".
Passing sentence, the judge, Mr Justice Holroyde, said the pair "crossed the line between the legitimate expression of your own views and a criminal act".
"A significant proportion of those listening to your words would be impressionable persons looking to you for guidance on how to act," he said.
He told Choudary he had failed to condemn "any aspect" of what IS was doing, adding: "In that way you indirectly encouraged violent terrorist activity."
Source: BBC News, September 6, 2016
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