Warning issued against executing Yemeni Islamist kidnapper

The Imam of Finsbury Park mosque in London, Sheikh Abu Hamzeh al-Masri, said that Westerners in Yemen will be killed if the leader of the kidnappers of 16 western tourists in Yemen is executed.

Al-Masri said on Thursday in London replying to a question asked by the Qatari al-Jazira satellite station: "If Zein al-Abidin al-Muhdar is be executed there will be revenge acts. Committing massacres (against the westerners)."

Yemen in August 1998 approved a law allowing implelmentation of the death penalty for kidnappers.

Sheikh al-Masri also expected the "situation to be deteriorated in Yemen" if al-Muhdar is executed.

Al-Masri is of Egyptian origin and fought in Afghanistan where he lost his hands and an eye.