Nigeria convicts separatist leader Nnamdi Kanu of terrorism

Nigeria's High Court has convicted separatist leader Nnamdi Kanu on seven terrorism-related charges.

At the trial in Abuja on Thursday, Judge James Omotosho ruled that prosecutors provided “incontroverted evidence” that Kanu’s broadcasts to the now-banned Indigenous People of Biafra, or Ipob, group incited deadly attacks on security forces and citizens in the country’s south east. The judge described Kanu’s actions as “preparatory” to terrorism.

In 1967, an attempt by Nigeria’s southeastern region to secede as the Republic of Biafra in triggered a three-year civil war that killed more than 1 million people before the rebels were defeated.

Kanu started Radio Biafra in 2009, broadcasting from London to Nigeria. Five years later, he founded the separatist Ipob movement.

Kanu had declined to present a defense and earlier this month filed a motion to dismiss the charges against him, saying they were a “nullity.”

He was forcibly removed from the courtroom on Thursday before the verdict was delivered because of unruly behaviour.

Kanu remains a deeply polarizing figure: reviled by authorities, but revered by many in the southeast.