Corbyn protested against extradition as Choudary rallied for the same cause
Labour leader gave speech outside High Court in 2012 as hate preacher led demonstration nearby
‘Jeremy has a long record of support for due legal process, especially in the most controversial of cases’
JEREMY CORBYN protested against the extradition of British terror suspects to the United States as Anjem Choudary, a mentor to the London Bridge attacker, led a rally for the same cause just yards away.
The Labour leader spoke outside the Royal Courts of Justice in 2012 before Moazzam Begg, a former Guantanamo Bay detainee, who argued that five men, among them the notorious hate preacher Abu Hamza, should not be deported.
Two of the men were aides to Osama bin Laden and wanted in connection to the 1998 bombings of the US embassies in East Africa, whilst the other pair later pleaded guilty to providing material support for terrorists.
Speaking just hours before High Court judges dismissed the final appeal of the five men against extradition, Mr Corbyn told the gathering: “We are fighting against the overwhelming power of the USA to extradite people from this country.”
Photographs and video footage taken at the event in central London show Mr Corbyn standing next to Asim Qureshi, the Cage UK spokesman, who in 2015 described Mohammed Emwazi, the Isil terrorist, as a “beautiful man”.
Just 30 yards away, Choudary, the co-founder of the British terror group Al-muhajiroun, was also protesting at a second demonstration against the extraditions along with Siddartha Dhar and Mohammed Reza Haque, two men who would later become “poster boys” for Isil.
Choudary was a known associate of Usman Khan, the London Bridge terrorist, and in 2012 described the 28-year-old and several of his co-conspirators in a London Stock Exchange bomb plot as “students of mine”.
Last night, a Labour spokesman said that Mr Corbyn “completely condemns Anjem Choudary and his hateful, dangerous views” but declined to say whether he was aware of the cleric’s presence outside the court.
Yesterday, Mr Corbyn launched a scathing attack on British foreign policy, declaring that the War on Terror had “manifestly failed” to make the country safer.
Highlighting the London Bridge atrocity, he claimed “for far too long” successive governments had “made the wrong calls on our security” and had “fuelled, not reduced that threat”.
“Their mistakes in no way absolve terrorists of blame for their murderous actions – the blame lies with the terrorists, their funders and recruiters,” he said in a speech in York. “But if we are to protect people, we must be honest about what threatens our security.”
He also clashed with Boris Johnson earlier in the day over his plans to bolster anti-terror legislation, telling Sky News that people convicted of terrorism offences should “not necessarily” serve a full sentence and that it “depends
on the circumstances”. Echoing his comments, Baroness Chakrabarti, the shadow attorney general, claimed it was “unedifying” to talk about “throwing away the keys”.
It comes seven years after Mr Corbyn attended the demonstration, held just hours before High Court judges dismissed a final appeal by the five men to avoid being tried in America. The protest was organised to oppose the extradition of Babar Ahmad and Talha Ahsan, who were accused of running a website which raised funds for militants in Afghanistan and Chechnya. They pled guilty a year later.
In his speech, Mr Corbyn did not single out the two men by name, stating only that he “came here this morning to support those who are facing extradition without any trial, without any process, without any accusation, without any conviction from this country.”
Approached for comment last night, a Labour spokesman said Mr Corbyn had only opposed their extradition and that his comments “predate” their subsequent convictions in the US.
A Labour spokesman said: “Jeremy has a long record of support for due legal process, especially in the most controversial of cases, as a vital cornerstone of our democratic system. He is a longstanding critic of the Us-led War on Terror, which has manifestly failed to keep us safe.
“He worked with members of his community, alongside the police and local council, to get Abu Hamza, the hate he preached, and his supporters removed from Finsbury Park Mosque.”