(AFP) A Stockholm court on Monday convicted a man of inciting ethnic hatred during four Koran burnings in 2023 that sparked outrage in Muslim countries, a verdict that reignited debate about the limits of freedom of expression.
The verdict came just days after the man’s co-defendant Salwan Momika, a 38-year-old Iraqi Christian, was shot dead late Wednesday in an apartment southwest of Stockholm.
The Stockholm district court was to have published its verdict against Momika and 50-year-old Salwan Najem the following day, but after Momika’s killing postponed it until Monday.
“There is a wide scope within the framework of freedom of expression to be critical of a religion in a factual and objective debate,” Judge Goran Lundahl said in a statement.
