Wife of Al Qaeda recruiter appeals against her own terror conviction

In a case that has already cost UK taxpayers tens of thousands of pounds, Sylvie Beghal, 45, who lives on benefits in Leicester, is seeking to overturn her conviction for refusing to co-operate with British police who were investigating her husband.

Djamel Beghal, 50, a former disciple of the hate clerics Abu Hamza and Abu Qatada, is known to have met with at least two of the gunmen who terrorised Paris last week – and hosted on-the-run suspect Hayat Boumeddiene for ‘crossbow practice’ while he was under house arrest in France.

French citizen Mrs Beghal and the couple’s four children still live in Leicester where she is awaiting judgment on her case after taking her appeal all the way to the Supreme Court.

Three years ago she was arrested and charged after being stopped at a British airport, where she refused to answer questions about her husband, who is in prison in France facing charges of leading a terrorist organisation.

She pleaded guilty to at least one charge related to terror laws but later appealed against the conviction on human rights grounds. 

Her case, being supported by pressure group Cage and the Muslim Council of Britain, is understood to have been brought using legal aid as it proceeded through the High Court, Appeal Court and Supreme Court.

Beghal, a French citizen born in Algeria, lived in Britain during the late 1990s where he was a regular at Finsbury Park Mosque and came under the influence of Abu Hamza and Abu Qatada. 

But he later moved with his family to Afghanistan – allegedly because he was inspired by Qatada – was arrested as a suspected terrorist just weeks before the 9/11 attacks and subsequently convicted in France for his links to Al Qaeda in 2005.

(dailymail.co.uk)