Hate preacher Abu Hamza found guilty in US

British hate preacher Abu Hamza has been found guilty of terror offences in New York over the 1998 abduction of 16 Western tourists in Yemen.

A court sketch of British hate preacher Abu Hamza

UK preacher Abu Hamza. (AAP)

Jurors in the New York trial of British hate preacher Abu Hamza have found him guilty of kidnapping and terrorism offences.

The former imam of the north London Finsbury Park mosque, real name Mustafa Kamel Mustafa, showed no reaction to the verdict, which carries a possible life sentence. He is to be sentenced September 9.

The charges against him pre-dated the 9/11 attacks on New York and were over the 1998 abduction of 16 Western tourists in Yemen, four of whom were killed in a military rescue operation.

He was also accused of trying to set up a terrorist training camp in the US in 1999, and of promoting "violent jihad" on a global scale.

The jury deliberated for 12 hours over two days before reaching a verdict, after a four-week trial in which Abu Hamza took the stand for three days of testimony in his own defence.

Blind in one eye and with no hands after an accidental explosion in Pakistan, the 56-year-old had denied all the charges, though he acknowledged he occasionally used strong words in his sermons and fiery speeches - numerous extracts of which were played for the jury.

He admitted supplying a satellite to the Islamist group that kidnapped the Western tourists in Yemen, but said he was only told of the abduction after the fact.

He also said he threw in the rubbish a fax in which a young man who attended his mosque told him of plans to build a jihad training camp in Oregon in 1999. He said he didn't know another of the young men at his mosque had left to fight in Afghanistan.

Abu Hamza was arrested in August 2004 in Britain at Washington's request, and sentenced in a British court to seven years in jail in 2006 for inciting murder and racial hatred.

He was extradited to the US in October 2012.


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Source: AAP



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