Stockholm: A Swedish citizen was sentenced to six months in jail yesterday for inciting people to finance Islamic State (IS) group through Facebook, a landmark case for the country.
In a Facebook account linked to Ahmad Qadan, 34, a post written in Swedish and published on August 21, 2013 said: “Help us supply our brothers at the front with weapons so they can avenge their brothers and sisters.”
Malmo district court judge Lennart Strinas said the case had no precedent in Sweden.
“The crime the man has been convicted of might have been at an early stage in chain of events but it could have led to a terrorist crime,” he said.
Those who read the post were urged to call two named men to receive a bank account number where money could be sent, the court said. One of the named men in the post is listed as a terror financier by the United Nations and the European Union.
The posts “had been published in such a way that anyone with access to Internet could read them, even people without a Facebook account,” the court said. In his testimony, Qadan denied the charges and said he took over the Facebook account from a person whose name he did not know.
