On Monday (11 September), a Dutch court docket sentenced a former Pakistani cricketer to 12 years in jail for urging folks to homicide Dutch chief Geert Wilders. The court docket introduced the sentence in his absence as Latif lives in Pakistan and has neither attended any stage of the trial nor been detained within the Netherlands.
According to the Dutch court docket, the remarks made by 37-year-old Khalid Latif ought to be thought to be incitement to homicide, sedition, and menace. The court docket said that the prosecutors had proved that the Pakistani cricketer posted a video in 2018, wherein he supplied a 3 million rupee (round 21,000 euros on the time) reward for the homicide of Greet Wilders.
The Hague district court docket stated, “The words used by the suspect are explicit: he promises to pay a considerable sum of money to anyone who engages in a specific act, namely the killing of Mr Wilders.”
The court docket was knowledgeable about protests the place Dutch flags had been burned and different protestors additionally known as for the killing of Wilders.
Regarding this, the court docket added, “It is very likely that someone – anywhere in the world – would feel compelled to act on this call.”
However, the prosecutor advised the court docket that The Netherlands and Pakistan haven’t any treaties in place in issues of judicial cooperation or extradition. The prosecution additionally highlighted that earlier cooperation requests on this case didn’t obtain any response from the Pakistani aspect.
Notably, the video the place Latif gave the decision for violence and killing the Dutch chief got here after Wilders introduced that he had deliberate to carry a contest for cartoons depicting caricatures of the Prophet Mohammad. However, the competitors was later cancelled. In Islam, photos of the Prophet Mohammad are forbidden and are thought-about a type of idolatry. Additionally, most Muslims regard caricatures as extremely offensive.
Meanwhile, no fast response may very well be obtained from the previous Pakistan Cricketer Khalid Latif who as soon as captained the Pakistan aspect within the 2010 Asian Games. But in 2017, he obtained a five-year ban from cricket in 2017 over a spot-fixing scandal.
Earlier, the prosecution demanded that Khalid Latif ought to be served 12 years of jail time period for issuing a bounty towards the Dutch chief.
During the trial, Wilders additionally asserted {that a} conviction would ship a “powerful signal to all others who issue threats: we won’t accept it.”
He additionally added that he wouldn’t cease by these threats and stated, “As long as I’m living and breathing, you won’t stop me. Your call to kill me and pay money for it is abject and will not silence me.”
Geert Wilders (60) is considered one of Europe’s most distinguished leaders who has been shaping the immigration debate within the Netherlands over the previous 20 years, regardless of by no means being in authorities.
His Freedom Party (PVV) is the third-largest within the Dutch parliament and is the primary opposition celebration. Since 2004, he has been dwelling underneath fixed police safety.
