LONDON (Reuters) -An Afghan national was jailed for five years on Tuesday after being found guilty of making a threat to kill Nigel Farage, leader of the populist Reform UK party that leads opinion polls in Britain.
Fayaz Khan was last week convicted by a jury at London’s Southwark Crown Court of a single count of making a threat to kill Farage in a TikTok video posted in October 2024, as he documented his journey from Sweden to Britain.
Prosecutors said Khan posted a video in response to one by Farage, in which Khan – who has an AK-47 assault rifle tattooed on his face – said “pop, pop, pop” while making gun gestures.
FARAGE SAYS HE HAS ‘MIXED FEELINGS’
Farage gave evidence that he was “genuinely worried” about Khan’s threat, describing the video as “chilling”. Khan had denied his video was a genuine threat.
Farage sat in the public gallery as Judge Karen Steyn sentenced Khan for making a threat to kill and a separate charge of attempting to enter Britain illegally, to which he had pleaded guilty.
Khan shouted at the judge and Farage after he was sentenced, telling Farage: “You want to be prime minister … you fucked my life.”
Outside the court, Farage said he was pleased with Khan’s sentence but concerned he would be released relatively soon, though Khan is liable to automatic deportation.
Prosecutor Peter Ratliff said Khan had given a false name and date of birth on arrival in Britain on a small boat.
Steyn said she was sure Khan gave a false name because he had a six-month jail sentence pending in Sweden.
“The threat to kill Nigel Farage which you made … quickly reached him, as you had intended,” she told Khan.
She said Farage understood that as a lawmaker and political party leader he faced public scrutiny, criticism and at times abuse.
“But your video was not mere abuse – it was a threat to kill with a firearm and it was, as Mr Farage put it, ‘pretty chilling’,” she said.
(Reporting by Sam Tobin, editing by William James, Sharon Singleton and Timothy Heritage)
