LONDON, Jan 24: A radical Muslim religious figure on Friday defiantly conducted a prayer service outside his mosque in north London, after it was closed following a dramatic raid by police.
Abu Hamza, an Egyptian-born who supported the Taliban, told about 150 people who gathered on the road: “Who can be more evil than those who tried to close down places of worship?”
Six rows of men and boys knelt on their coats on the road outside the Finsbury Park mosque, known for being frequented by hardliners, as Hamza chanted “Allahu Akbar”.
The charitable trust responsible for running the building had boarded it up on Thursday, saying it was unsafe.
Addressing the crowd in Arabic and in English outside the red-brick mosque, Hamza vowed worshippers would return every Friday to pray on the same spot.
A note from the North London Central Mosque Trust, pinned to the main gate of the building, said it would be reopened as soon as possible, and had been closed for “health and safety” reasons because of its state of disrepair.
“It’s all lies”, said one of the mosque’s officials, Abu Maria, an Algerian, after tearing down the notice.
Hamza himself, wearing a turban and draped in a tunic, said: “They want to silence the mosque. We will never allow a government to silence us.”
He urged more worshippers to turn up for prayers next Friday.
A dozen police officers were on the scene, but stood back from where the prayers were taking place.
Some of the men in the crowd held banners under the name of the radical Muslim group, Al Muhajiroun, which said: “British government, you will pay, the caliphate is on its way”.—AFP
