The US government is considering granting asylum to a protester who burned a Koran outside a Turkish consulate in London.
Hamit Coskun held the flaming Islamic text above his head and shouted ‘f*** Islam’ during a protest in Rutland Gardens in Knightsbridge, on February 13 last year.
Turkish-born Mr Coskun is half-Kurdish, half-Armenian and an atheist.
He was convicted of a religiously aggravated public order offence last June but later won an appeal against his conviction after a judge said ‘blasphemy’ was not a crime.
The Crown Prosecution Service is appealing against the decision, with the case due to be heard on Tuesday.
US state department officials are said to be preparing to help Mr Coskun in the event that he loses his appeal, and that the case is one of several regarding free speech that the Trump administration has ‘made note of’.
Mr Coskun has applied for asylum in the UK and is still awaiting a decision – but claims he has had threats made against him and may be forced to flee Britain.
He revealed that he had originally come to Britain because of fears over Islamic terrorists.
The US government is considering granting asylum to protester Hamit Coskun who burned a Koran outside a Turkish consulate in London
Mr Coskun held a flaming Islamic text aloft and shouted ‘f*** Islam’ during a protest in Rutland Gardens last year
Mr Coskun told The Telegraph: ‘For me, as the victim of Islamic terrorism, I cannot remain silent. I may be forced to flee the UK and move to the USA, where President Trump has stood for free speech and against Islamic extremism.
‘If I have to do so, then, to me, the UK will have effectively fallen to Islamism and the speech codes that it wishes to impose on the non-Muslim world.’
At a High Court hearing earlier this month, Mr Justice Linden said Mr Coskun had asked the Home Office to provide him with accommodation, saying his ‘life has been threatened on a number of occasions’ and there had been ‘several acts of violence against him’.
Mr Coskun also asked that the housing come with ‘certain conditions’ so that ‘he could live there safely’, the court heard.
Under section 4 of the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999, the Home Office can offer accommodation to current or former asylum seekers, or those who have had claims rejected, which can be provided ‘subject to other conditions’.
Mr Coskun was fined £240 after he was initially convicted in June.
District Judge John McGarva said Mr Coskun had a ‘deep-seated hatred of Islam and its followers’, and rejected the idea that the prosecution was ‘an attempt to bring back and expand blasphemy law’.
Blasphemy laws were abolished in England and Wales in 2008 and in Scotland in 2021, but blasphemy and blasphemous libel remain offences in Northern Ireland.
The Crown Prosecution Service is appealing against the decision, with the case due to be heard on Tuesday. Pictured: Mr Coskun leaving court following his conviction in June, which was later overturned
However four months later the decision was overturned by Mr Justice Bennathan at Southwark Crown Court.
The judge said that the right to freedom of expression ‘must include the right to express views that offend, shock or disturb’.
He said: ‘There is no offence of blasphemy in our law. Burning a Koran may be an act that many Muslims find desperately upsetting and offensive.
‘The criminal law, however, is not a mechanism that seeks to avoid people being upset, even grievously upset.’
Mr Coskun said that if he wins the appeal, he will resume his ‘campaign’ to oppose political Islam. If he loses however, he said it would mean there was ‘no longer’ free speech in Britain.