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March 18, 2006
UK: Lashkar-e-Taiba Islamist Jailed For Nine Years
Though apparently ignored by much of the UK press, a Coventry man was yesterday sentenced at Snaresbrook Crown Court to a sentence of nine years for conspiring to provide funds for terrorist activities, states Hindustan Times.
The man, Mohammed Ajmal Khan, aged 31, gathered millions of pounds from British supporters, which was used by the group Lashkar-e-Taiba to purchase Kevlar body armour, firearms and surveillance equipment, which were then passed on to insurgents in Afghanistan and Kashmir (the Indian state of Jammu & Kashmir).
Justice Fulford, the presiding judge said he had made available funds from an "unidentified but undeniably terrorist-related source." The judge also said the government should urgently consider implementing a higher sentencing tariff for terror cases. The maximum sentence available for such a crime is 14 years' jail, but as Khan pleaded guilty the judge could only give him a nine year sentence.
Khan admitted that from March 2001 he conspired to provide money and property to terrorists for a period of four years. He admitted directing terrorist organisation and also the membership of Lashkar-e-Taiba, which is banned under the UK Terrorism Act 2000.
According to Stop Political Terror, Khan was arrested on Tuesday 1 March by anti-terror police in Coventry, where he apparently lived with his elderly parents.
Two others arrested with him, Palvinder SIngh and Firzana Khan, appeared ar the Old Bailey on 14 March 2005 and were remanded in custody.
41-year old Firzana Khan has also admitted her guilt on similar charges. A housewife from Coventry, she still awaits her sentencing.
It was suggested that the recent bomb attacks on March 7 at Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh, India, were the work of Lashkar-e-Taiba. The multiple bombs followed a precedent set at the Delhi blasts of October 29 last year. Then, a little known group calling itself Islami Inquilab-e-Mahaz confessed initially to the attacks, and Lashkar-e-Taiba denied involvement, even offering sympathy to victims.
Two days after the Varanasi blasts, a thitherto unknown group calling itself Lashkar-e-Qahab or Lashkar-e-Kahar (Army of Fury) claimed responsibility for the atrocity, according to Mid-day.com. A representative of this group said that there would be more blasts if the Indian government did not desist from its "catch and kill" actions against terrorists in Jammu & Kashmir state.
A day after the blast, a Lashkar-e-Taiba operative was shot dead by the Special Task Force SSP in Lucknow, states India's The Tribune. Five students went missing from a madrassa in Jammu & Kashmir and were being treated as potential suspects in the Varanasi blasts.
Eight people were arrested in Hardoi, 100 kilometers from Lucknow on March 10. It appears that such a well-planned attack is the work of Lashkar-e-Taiba, and the group "Army of Fury" is only a front for the organisation.
One positive thing did come out of the Varanasi attacks - according to the Times of India, Muslim women from the Hindu holy city pressured Maulana Abdul Batin Nomani of the three-hundred year old Shahi Masjid Gyanvapi, to issue a three-page fatwa condemning terrorism.
Posted by Giraldus Cambrensis at March 18, 2006 6:16 PM
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