Verdict due in Sweden over Jordanian pilot burned alive

A Palestinian man holds a candle and portrait of slain Jordanian pilot, Lieutenant Maaz al-Kassasbeh, killed by Isis, during a candlelight vigil in 2015 outside the Nativity Church. Photo / Getty Images

A Stockholm court was to hand down a verdict tonight NZT in a Swedish jihadist’s trial over the murder of a Jordanian pilot burned alive by Isis in Syria.

The Swedish court is the first to try a person over the killing, which sparked an international outcry in 2015. It is due to deliver a verdict at 9pm NZT.

On December 24, 2014, an aircraft belonging to the Royal Jordanian Air Force crashed in Syria.

The pilot, Maaz al-Kassasbeh, was captured the same day by Isis fighters near the central city of Raqqa and was burned alive in a cage sometime before February 3, 2015, when a video of the gruesome killing was published, according to the prosecution.

Prosecutors have been unable to determine the exact date of the murder but the investigation has identified the location.

Osama Krayem, a 32-year-old Swede, is already serving long prison sentences for his role in the Paris and Brussels terror attacks in 2015 and 2016.

Krayem’s Stockholm trial was held between June 4 and 26 and prosecutors have asked the court to hand down a life sentence for “serious war crimes and terrorist crimes” for his role in the pilot’s killing.

The 32-year-old jihadist remained silent throughout the hearings, though segments from interrogations with Krayem conducted during the investigation were read out and played during the trial.

According to his lawyer, Krayem insisted he had spent only 15 to 20 minutes on-site, unaware of what was going to happen.

The lawyer for the pilot’s brother, who was a civil party to the case, lamented that Krayem showed no empathy or remorse in court.

“Most people who witnessed what Maaz went through would undoubtedly need lifelong, or at least long-term, treatment to overcome the trauma that this causes in a normal individual,” Mikael Westerlund told the court.

The pilot’s brother had travelled from Jordan for the trial to testify to the pain, still raw, that he shares with his loved ones.

“Krayem, on the other hand, does not seem to have been traumatised, but inspired.

“Inspired to continue his terrorist activities, which led him to participate in and then be convicted of terrorist acts in Europe,” Westerlund added.

Krayem, who is from Malmo in southern Sweden, was sentenced to 30 years in prison in France for helping plan the November 2015 Paris attacks and to life imprisonment in Belgium for the 2016 attacks at Brussels’ main airport and metro station.

-Agence France-Presse