Salman Rushdie attacker faces terrorism trial in US court

Hadi Matar, who attacked author Salman Rushdie in 2022 leaving him blind in one eye, has gone on trial in a US federal court on transnational terrorism charges. Prosecutors say he acted to fulfil the Iranian fatwa against Rushdie.

New York: The man who attacked author Salman Rushdie, blinding his right eye, went on trial on transnational terrorism charges in a federal court on Wednesday.

Hadi Matar attacked to “fulfil the fatwa”, the Iranian religious edict demanding Rushdie’s killing because his novel Satanic Verses was considered blasphemous by Islamic clerics, assistant federal prosecutor Timothy Lynch told the court in Buffalo.

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Matar was convicted last year in New York State court of attempting to murder and sentenced to 25 years in prison. He now faces federal terrorism charges under a separate set of laws.

In the US, state and federal laws are separate, and a person can be tried on related charges for a single offence under different local and federal statutes. If convicted of the terrorism charge, Matar could face life in prison.

Matar, who is a US citizen of Lebanese descent, attacked Rushdie on a stage during a literary programme in 2022 at the Chautauqua Institution, a literary and arts centre about 600 kilometres from the city. The federal trial is taking place in Buffalo, close to the Canada border.

Matar has denied the conspiracy charges. His lawyer Nathaniel Barone said that he was acting on his own and, as a religious person, was “enraged” against Rushdie.

The late Ayatollah Khomeini issued the fatwa against Rushdie, a Booker Prize‑winning author, who then went into hiding for several years under British government protection.

Rushdie now lives in the US wearing an eyepatch over his right eye and is expected to testify at the trial. He has written a memoir, Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder, about the attack and its aftermath.

Ironically, at the event where he was attacked, he was to have spoken about the protection of writers.