By MELISSA EDDY
Sven Lau in court in Düsseldorf, Germany, on Wednesday. Credit Sascha Steinbach/European Pressphoto Agency
BERLIN — A German court on Wednesday sentenced one of the country’s best-known Islamic extremists to more than five years in prison for raising money and recruiting people for the Islamic insurgency in Syria.
The Düsseldorf state court found the man, Sven Lau, 36, guilty of “serving as a contact for those willing to leave the country and fight” with the Army of Emigrants and Helpers, known by the Arabic acronym Jamwa, which is close to the Islamic State.
“From July to November 2013, he played a significant role in bringing two men living in Germany to a Jamwa unit in Syria,” Frank Schreiber, the presiding judge, said in his ruling. One of the men went on to fight with the group in Syria.
Mr. Lau supplied the group with money he had collected in Germany and military materials, including night-vision goggles. He was given a sentence of five years and six months in prison, which the judge said reflected the severity of the crime, despite Mr. Lau’s lack of a previous criminal record.
Source: News Now/ New York Times
