Why the UK does not have blasphemy laws even if the press claim otherwise:

A man has been fined £240 after he set fire to a Quran outside the Turkish consulate in London. Mr Coskun is half Kurdish and half Armenian and was born in Turkey. He stated on social media that he wanted to ‘protest the Islamist Government of Erdogan who has made Turkey a base for radical Islamists and is trying to establish a Sharia regime’¹. The case was heard before a judge sitting in the Magistrates court meaning he was both the finder of fact and responsible to issuing a sentence in this case.

Following this, a man came out of a property nearby and called Mr Coskun a “fucking idiot” and Mr Coskun repeatedly said “fuck you” and “fuck Islam”. The man responded with a death threat entered the property and reemerged with a knife, attacked Mr Coskun and then kicked and spat at him. Ms Coskun was also kicked by a passing delivery driver.

Following the police arrived and took him to hospital. Later he was arrested and interviewed by police. In his rucksack, which was searched by police, was a t-shirt which had the words “Islam is a terrorist ideology. The Quran should be banned”.

He was convicted of a religiously aggravated public order offence contrary to S.31(1)(c) of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 and S.5 of the Public Order Act 1986. His lawyers made both a abuse of process argument and argued there was insufficient evidence to convict him because he was criticising Islam not targeting Muslims. The judge rejected both of these arguments for reasons discussed below.

Under S.5 of the Public Order Act 1986²:

A person is guilty of this offence if they 1- Use threatening/ abusive words or behaviour. 2- Engage in disorderly behvaiour. 3- Display writing, signs or visible representation.

which is threatening or abusive within hearing or sight of a person likely to be caused harassment alarm or distress by their actions or speech. The term disorderly has its everyday meaning.

S.6(4) outlines the mens rea for this offence³:

A person is guilty of an offence under section 5 only: 1- If he intends his actions or speech to be threatening or abusive. 2- Is aware that it may be threatening or abusive. 3- They intends the behaviour to be or is aware that it may be disorderly.

The term disorderly has the same meaning as above.

There is a defence to the offence which is²:

1- There was no reason to believe there was anyone within hearing or sight that was likely to be caused harassment, alarm or distress. 2- The action took place inside a home and there was no reason to believe their speech or actions would be heard or seen by a person outside the home. 3- The conduct was reasonable.

S.31(1)(c) of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 states⁴:

A person is guilty of an offence under this section if they commit a S.5 Public Order Act offence ‘which is racially aggravated for the purposes of this section.’

S.28(1) of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 outlines the meaning of racially aggravated as⁵:

1- At the time of committing the offence, immediately before or immediately after the offender demonstrated towards hostility towards a victim due to their membership/ presumed membership of a racial group. 2- The offence is motivated in whole or in part by hostility towards members of a racial group based on their membership of that group.

It is immaterial whether the offender is making a presumption as to victim’s membership of a religious group and other factor not mentioned in S.28 are also immaterial.

Under S.28, racial group means a ‘group of persons defined by reference to race, colour, nationality (including citizenship) or ethnic or national origins’.

Abuse of process defence:

Mr Coskun’s lawyers argued the charges were an abuse of process because they were an attempt to reintroduce blasphemy laws in England and Wales. They also argued it was an attempt to expand these laws to cover Islam, which they had never applied to. The particular abuse of process is called manipulation of process. The remedy, if the argument succeeded, was a stay of proceedings, which in these circumstances would be extraordinary.

What is a manipulation of process?

The Lady Chief justice gave a summary of the legal standards for manipulation of process in R v NG⁶:

This type of abuse occurs ‘where the police or prosecuting authorities have engaged in misconduct, and that such abuse is by its nature very rarely found’. There are two parts that must be proved:

1- ‘First, it must be determined whether and in what respect the prosecutorial authorities have been guilty of misconduct, such as very serious examples of malpractice and unlawfulness (as opposed to state incompetence or negligence)’ 2- ‘it must be determined whether such misconduct justifies a stay on the ground of abuse of process. This requires an evaluation of the particular facts and circumstances of each case, weighing the public interest in ensuring that those charged with crimes should be tried, against the competing public interest in maintaining confidence in the criminal justice system’

The defence has the burden of proving the abuse occurred and standard of proof is on the balance of probabilities.

The judge found that a previous set of charged might have been problematic but the current charges were not problematic. He states clearly the charges do not relate to criticism of Islam but rather disorderly behaviour, a criminal offence. The trial will determine whether this was merely an act or protest or a crime. It will also assess his human rights claims and whether any interference is justifiable. The burden of proof to prove that this behaviour was criminal lies with the prosecution and Ms Coskun has the benefit of a defence and the presumption of innocence. Therefore the judge ruled there was no abuse of proceedings and declined the request for a stay.

Why was he found guilty:

The defence went on to argue, if there was no abuse of process, that the allegations were not made out because:

1- There ‘is no or insufficient evidence for a court properly directed to find the defendant acted in a disorderly manner.’ 2- There ‘is no or insufficient evidence to show the defendant was motivated by hostility to a particular group.’ 3- There ‘is no or insufficient evidence that he was aware his actions would be or maybe disorderly’ 4- ‘a conviction would not be a proportionate interference with his convention rights’

I address each argument in turn but I address point 4 in the section below.

Defence argument 1:

The judge rejected the first defence argument because there was material that proved his behaviour was disorderly. While burning the Quran may not be disorderly itself, choosing to do so outside the Turkish consulate, in a visible way, declaring what he was doing and yelling insults directed towards Islam and Muslims in a place were Muslims would be was clearly provocative in the judges view.

Defence argument 3:

The judge found there was evidence that he knew his behaviour was disorderly, therefore he rejected the third argument by the defence.

This is because Mr Coskun declared his intent to carry out the Quran burnings online and posted a video of him burning another Quran. He stated he was motivated by the murder of another man for burning a Quran in Sweden. Between the social media response, which included threats, and the death of the man in Sweden, it was clear he knew the conduct would be disorderly.

Defence argument 2:

The judge rejected the second argument because there was evidence to suggest the act was motivated to due hostility towards Muslims. Ms Coskum gave evidence that states ‘His mother’s family had been victims of the Armenian genocide in 1915. He is an atheist and wants to live in a secular society’. He believed President Erdogan is steering Turkey towards a future governed by Sharia law. He states he had no issue with Muslims and was merely criticisng Islam but also stated that 99% of Muslims were rapists in his police interview. He often avoided answering the judges questions in court. In the judgment the judge states ‘In his evidence he talked about Islam being the religion of terror whereas on tape he can be heard to say Islam is the religion of terrorism.’

The Judge acknowledges the distinction between Islam and its followers are important in this case and goes on to analyse it. He goes on to quote Mr Coskun’s police interview. In his interview he said

“I do not have any problem or prejudice against Muslim people so long as they do not use violence… This is their human rights… I am just against thinking of these people, religious trying to spread religion. The base of this religion is this. There is a thinking. That thinking is just inciting people to use violence. It’s causing people to just destroy anyone who does not believe or think in the same way as they do. That’s what I am against”.

Later on when asked what he meant by terrorist in the video of the interview he says

“Through the instructions of order of Quran really. Those who do not believe of Muslim people, Atheist, Christian. Terrorists are people who just follow rules of the Quran book to destroy anyone who do not believe in their own, their way. That’s the ideology of Islam. They initially just invade, then they keep getting more and more of themselves. A woman gives a child, breeds children, as many as they can for example other countries and could not wait and when they got bigger, they just destroy the others. They corrupt other properties or anything that they own and use their children as slaves. I mean that’s the way that Islam is designed, nothing else. I mean can you imagine a book is allowing paedophiles to do what they are doing"

On the basis of the above, the judge rejects the argument Mr Coskun was merely criticsing Islam. Its clear he has a ‘deep-seated hatred of Islam and its followers’ therefore in this case his views of Muslims cannot be separated from his views of Islam.

The judge does accept that the choice of location was also due to his criticisms of the Turkish government, therefore he finds there was a dual purpose with regard to his motivation and it was at least partly motivated by a hatred of Muslims which is what S.5 requires.

Did this interfere with Mr Coskun’s ECHR rights:

The rights that are engaged in this context are freedom of thought, religion and freedom of expression and assembly. The court must carry out a proportionality assessment if the rights are being interfered with, as they are in this case. The judge concluded his rights were being interfered with because in part, Mr Coskun’s actions were an act of protest.

Each of these rights is qualified in the ECHR, meaning there are legitmate reasons for interfering with each right, states within the ECHR itself. The aim of the Public Order Act is to prevent public disorder and control public gatherings. The qualifications in the ECHR are clear, the aim of preventing public disorder is a permissible interference with the rights in principle.

Finally, the judge had to consider whether this was a proportionate inference in this situation: namely is there a rational connection between the aim and the measure taken to achieve the aim as well as whether there are less restrictive ways of achieving the aim of preventing public disorder.

The judge found a rational connection between the offences and the aim of preventing public disorder. The act has a provison stating these offences do not preclude criticism of religion but given the judges findings Mr Coskun’s behaviour went beyond that. The judges notes Mr Coskun could have made his critiques in a less provocative way that did not include targeting Muslims.

As a result of the above, the judge found Mr Coskun guilty of the offence.

Why is this not in fact a case about blasphemy?

A number of newspapers ran headlines about this case with headlines indicating that blasphemy laws had returned despite being abolished in 2008 in England and Wales and 2024 in Scotland.⁷ The Spectator ran a headline stating ‘England now has a blasphemy law’ with a photo of the Quran in a spotlight.⁸ The Express ran a headline stating ‘Koran burning conviction sparks fury as blasphemy law ‘returns to UK’.⁹

Blasphemy laws criminalize actions considered disrespectful to religion. This is clearly not that type of law. As detailed above, this was a public disorder case with a racial aggravation, colloquially known as a hate crime, not a case prohibiting criticism of a religion.

A number of individuals in the UK have long had an obsession with hate crime laws being used to protect Muslims really being blasphemy laws. Douglas Murray has written many pieces in the spectator magazine about this.¹⁰ Nick Timothy, a Conservative party MP wishes to legislate to prevent the reintroduction of blasphemy laws.¹¹ Mr Timothy has even argued the attempt by Labour to define Islamophobia is itself an attempt to create blasphemy laws and protect Islam above and beyond the protection offered to other faiths.¹² Given that the UK government has accepted the IHRA’s definition of anti-semitism, this is clearly incorrect.¹³. Murray has made a similar argument.¹⁰.

So what is the outrage and the false headlines about?

Free speech concerns:

The judge said it was not the criticism of Islam, something that is allowed under the Public Order Act and Human Rights law that led to Mr Coskun’s conviction, but a hatred of Muslims and an act designed in part to target them. Free speech is not Free speech without consequences.

To be clear, the response to Mr Coskun by two individuals was extremely violent and both men are likely to be investigated by the police. The man who attacked him with a knife is likely to be charged with serious offences against the person depending on the nature of Mr Coskun’s injuries. The judge made clear nothing could justify the violence Mr Coskun was the victim of. But that does not preclude him from being convicted of an offence that limits free speech that is hateful of minorities.

Blasphemy laws:

As mentioned above, we do not have such laws in England and Wales as well as Scotland. Furthermore, it was a Public Order Offence not a offence linked to religion in any way.

Concerns about the Public Order Act and its implication for the right to protest:

There are reasons to be concerned, however, making these arguments in the context of this case alone and not opposing the use of these laws against protesters motivated by other causes or opposing the Act in general, suggests this is not the true motive behind the critique of this law.

So if the concern is not being driven by human rights, concerns about the Public Order Act or Blapshemy laws, what is the reason for the outrage directed at this judgement:

Islamophobia.

The All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on British Muslims defined Islamophobia as “rooted in racism and is a type of racism that targets expressions of Muslimness or perceived Muslimness”.¹⁴ While this is not a legal definition, its clear Mr Coskun’s use stereotypes about Muslims as terrorists, enslavers and sexual offenders target Muslimness in a racist fashion.

Arguing using the law to protect Muslims from public order offences designed to target them and defining Islamophobia is a blasphemy law is in effect arguing protecting Muslims from hate is inherently a violation of everyone else’s freedom of speech rights. It is an attempt to use the language of human rights to argue we should be able to violate the human rights of Muslims. Such arguments are an attempt to deny Muslims equal protection under the laws of this country.

Barones Sayeeda Warsi, one of the most Muslim Politicians in this country, has written extensively about the effects of Islamophobia. Her most recent book is titled Muslims Don’t Matter. That is in effect the argument Timothy, Murray, The Spectator, The Express and others are making. They wish to say what they like about Muslims without fear of consequence, freedom of speech without consequence which is an inversion of the current law. The outrage directed at this judgment is perhaps the most recent episode that proves Muslims don’t matter in this country.

Regards IMI

You can find the judgment here: https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/Rex-v-Hamit-Coskun.pdf