Jail for jihadist Briton who recruited terrorists online
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A former burger bar worker who recruited Islamist extremists online, including Britain's youngest terrorism convict, to stage a global "holy war" was jailed for 12 years yesterday.
Aabid Khan, 23, built up a computer "encyclopaedia" of extremist material including a file on the Royal Family, Blackfriars Crown Court in London was told.
"The material seized from you is amongst the largest and most extensive ever discovered and thus makes this case one of the most serious of its type to come before the courts," said Judge Timothy Pontius. "It is that material which was possessed by you for a specific intention, to be used in due course to provide practical assistance in terrorist activity."
Khan, of Bradford, was jailed after being convicted on three counts of possessing articles for a purpose connected with terrorism. His cousin and "right-hand man" Sultan Muhammad, also 23, was jailed for 10 years for posessing similar material and making a record of information likely to be useful in terrorism.
On Monday, the court convicted the two men as well as Hammaad Munshi, who was 16 at the time of his arrest. Munshi will be sentenced next month.
The trial was told the material that Khan collected included personal information, including addresses, of the Queen, the Duke of Edinburgh, the Prince of Wales, Princes Andrew and Edward and the Princess Royal. The judge said the most chilling find was a "folder demonstrating in careful, methodical and lethal detail the step-by-step instructions of how to make a suicide bomber's vest or belt packed with ball bearings and explosives".
As sentence was passed, Khan's father Sabir was forced from the court by guards after he accused Judge Pontius of being "anti-Muslim". Outside, he punched a reporter who asked his name. He was briefly held by a police officer before being told to "behave" and leave the building.