Radical activist Anjem Choudary, an influential figure in the British Islamist movement, was sentenced to life imprisonment today for leading a banned terrorist organization linked to several deadly attacks in recent years.
The 57-year-old Pakistani-born lawyer was sentenced to 28 years in prison at Woolwich Crown Court in London, where he was tried a year after his arrest following a joint investigation by the UK, US and Canada.
Choudary had been found guilty last week of leading Al-Mouhajiroun (ALM) since 2014, an organization banned in the UK since 2010.
Anjem Choudary has emerged as one of the leading figures of "Londonistan", the radical Islamist movement that took root in the British capital at the start of the 21st century.
The son of a stockbroker, he became a well-known figure among authorities and the media, organizing demonstrations outside mosques, embassies and police stations in the United Kingdom.
His ultimate goal, he said, was to fly the Islamic flag over 10 Downing Street, the Prime Minister’s residence.
However, thanks to his knowledge of the law, he avoided prison until 2016, when he was sentenced to five and a half years in prison for calling for support for the Islamic State group in a series of videos posted on the social media platform YouTube.
He was released in October 2018, after serving half of his sentence, but was kept under surveillance and on 17 July 2023 he was arrested in London.
Undercover US agents intercepted some of his internet contacts and an investigation established that Anjem Choudary had taken over leadership of ALM in 2014, when its founder, Omar Bakri, was arrested in Lebanon.
Anjem Choudary claimed during the trial that ITS “did not exist” and that ALM had been dismantled in 2004.
