Witness at trial over Luqman Shahzad murder argues attack was racially motivated
A witness testifying on Friday at the trial of the two men charged with the murder of Pakistani national Luqman Shahzad argued that the killing was racially motivated.
Luqman was stabbed seven times in January 2013 in the central Athens district of Petralona as he was cycling to work.
“[The attack] was motivated by racial hatred which speaks of the perpetrators’ ideology. A key characteristic was unjustified violence. It was a crime with political characteristics,” Dimitris Christopoulos, president of the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), told the court.
Defense lawyers asked the court to lift privacy restrictions on phone calls in a bid to prove that the two defendants, who have confessed to the crime, are in no way involved with the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party.
The trial resumes on February 14.
