Man found guilty of religiously aggravated offence after burning Koran in London

A 50-year-old Turkish-born man, Hamit Coskun, was found guilty on Monday of a religiously aggravated public order offence after burning a copy of the Koran outside the Turkish consulate in London earlier this year.

During the February incident, Coskun shouted “Islam is religion of terrorism” and “Koran is burning” as he set fire to the Islamic holy book. District Judge John McGarva, presiding at Westminster Magistrates’ Court, ruled that Coskun had used disorderly behaviour “within the hearing or sight of a person likely to be caused harassment, alarm or distress.”

The judge concluded that Coskun’s actions were “highly provocative” and at least partly motivated by hostility towards Muslims. He fined Coskun £240, with an additional statutory surcharge of £96.

Prosecutors stressed that Coskun was not charged for burning the book itself, but for his disorderly conduct in public. “He is being prosecuted for his disorderly behaviour in public,” said Crown Prosecution Service representative Philip McGhee.

Footage of the incident, captured by a passerby, showed a man—apparently armed with a blade—approaching and slashing at Coskun, the court was told.

An atheist currently seeking asylum in the UK, Coskun said his protest was aimed at the “Islamist government” of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. He has received legal support from the Free Speech Union (FSU) and the National Secular Society, which argue that his prosecution is a de facto enforcement of blasphemy laws under a different name.

Reacting to the ruling, the FSU called it “deeply disappointing,” asserting on social media that “everyone should be able to exercise their rights to protest peacefully and to freedom of expression, regardless of how offensive or upsetting it may be to some people.”

In a statement via the FSU, Coskun described his conviction as “an assault on free speech” and questioned whether he would have been prosecuted had he burned a Bible instead. “Christian blasphemy laws were repealed in this country more than 15 years ago… Would I have been prosecuted if I’d set fire to a copy of the Bible outside Westminster Abbey? I doubt it,” he said.