Lebanon sentences Muslim hate cleric Omar Bakri Mohammad to life in prison

LONDON - Islamist militant leader Omar Bakri Mohammad has said that he has been sentenced to life in prison by a Lebanon court.

Bakri said that he had been tried in his absence by the court for charges of forming a militant group with the purpose of weakening the Lebanese government.

The former London-based preacher, who was born in Syria and also holds Lebanese nationality, however denied the accusation.

“Now in Lebanon, on behalf of the Western powers, to please US and UK, Lebanese authorities take decision against 54 brothers,” Sky News quoted Bakri, as saying.

“I don’t know any one of them. They gave 25 of us (a) life sentence for a crime we did not commit at all. Maybe myself, radicalizing people as you like to say it, but no crime has been committed, neither in Lebanon or abroad,” he added.

Bakri further said that the charges had been laid because he and the others were Sunni Muslims.

He has been told that he has 15 days to appeal.

Bakri, who is currently living in the Libyan capital of Tripoli, had lived in the United Kingdom for nearly 20 years after being granted asylum in 1986.

While in the UK, he had founded the Al-Muhajiroun radical Islamist group and functioned from London until it was banned in 2005. (ANI)