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January 12, 2006
Germany: Islamist Jailed For Seven Years
Today, a German court in Munich sentenced an Iraqi Kurd to seven years' imprisonment for membership of, and recruitment for, an insurgent group, Ansar al-Islam, states Bloomberg, AFP via the Globe & Mail and Expatica.
Amin Lokman Mohamed, 33, arrived in Germany in 2000 as an asylum seeker. He was said by judges to have arranged travel to Iraq for wannabe jihadists, and procured money, computers and radios for Ansar al-Islam. He had also trafficked 70 Iraqis into Europe illegally.
He arranged for wounded insurgents to come to Europe for medical treatment,
The tough sentence is a positive result in what is seen as a test of Germany's more rigorous new terror laws. It is seen as a landmark, as it is the first conviction that involves a group not based on German soil.
Presiding judge Bernd von Heintschel-Heinegg said a tougher sentence would have been imposed if Mohamed had not admitted his activities. He could have received a sentence of 10 years. Heintshel-Heinegg also commended Mohamed for a public speech he made, which urged Islamists to stop suicide attacks.
Ansar al-Islam was founded in northern Iraq in September 2001, and aimed to establish a Sunni Islamist state in Iraq, modeled on the Taliban regime of Afghanistan (1996 - 2001). It renamed itself Jais Ansar al-SUnna in 2003, after the coalition invasion of Iraq, and has been involved with kidnappings, bombings, and shootings.
Amin Lokman Mohamed has been in custody since December 2003.
The interior minister for Bavaria, Guenther Beckstein, said in Munich that the verdict was an "appropriately strict and just punishment for a dangerous helper to the terrorists."
Posted by Giraldus Cambrensis at January 12, 2006 5:48 PM
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