Muslim cleric jailed for Afghan venture

A hard-line Muslim cleric who led thousands of Pakistani tribesmen into Afghanistan to fight with the Taliban was jailed for three years today.

Thirty men who fought with him received the same sentence.

Maulana Sufi Mohammed, the leader of the Tehrik Nifaz Shariat-e-Mohammedi movement which advocates imposing harsh Islamic law in northern Pakistan, was arrested in a remote tribal region on his return from Afghanistan with 30 companions.

The group was carrying a large quantity of weapons including Kalashnikov rifles, hand grenades, rocket launchers and heavy machine guns.

A senior government official of the tribal region of Kurram, who serves as a judge there, today found Mohammed guilty of possessing illegal weapons and inciting people to violence, and gave him the maximum sentence.