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STOCKHOLM: Prosecutors on Tuesday charged a Swedish militant over the 2014 capture and subsequent killing of a Jordanian pilot, who was burned to death in a cage in Syria by the Islamic State (IS) group.
Osama Krayem, 32, was charged with "participating in the brutal execution of a pilot" near the city of Raqqa, prosecutor Reena Devgun told a press conference.
Krayem, who is already serving a 30-year sentence for involvement in the November 2015 terror attacks in Paris, was charged with "serious war crimes and terrorist crimes".
According to prosecutors, who had announced they intended to charge Krayem last week, an aircraft belonging to the Royal Jordanian Air Force crashed in Syria on December 24, 2014.
The pilot was captured by IS fighters the same day near the central city of Raqqa, and killed sometime before February 3, 2015.
The execution was filmed and a 22-minute video accompanied by a specially composed religious chant was published.
In the video, the victim is seen walking past several masked IS fighters, including Krayem, according to prosecutors.
The pilot is then locked in a cage that is set on fire, leading to his death, Henrik Olin, the other prosecutor in charge of the case, told reporters.
"This bestial murder, in which a prisoner was burned alive in a cage, was staged in a carefully produced video that was broadcast around the world. Its publication marked an unprecedented escalation in the Islamic State group's violent propaganda," Olin said.
Prosecutors have been unable to determine the exact day of the murder, but the investigation has identified the location where it took place.
The defendant's lawyer, Petra Eklund, told AFP that her client admitted to being present at the scene but disputed the prosecution's version.
"He denies the acts for which he is prosecuted," she said.
"He acknowledges having been present at that place during the event but claims not to have acted in the manner described by the prosecutors in the account of the facts."
Krayem, who is from Malmo in southern Sweden, joined the IS group in Syria in 2014 before returning to Europe.
In June 2022, he was sentenced to 30 years in prison in France for helping plan the November 2015 Paris attacks in which 130 people were killed.
The following year, he was given a life sentence in Belgium for participating in the bombings on March 22, 2016, at Brussels' main airport and on the metro system, which killed 32 people.
"Even though this is a person that's already sentenced and is serving very long prison sentences in other countries, we will still charge him and we have an international obligation to do so," Devgun told AFP.
Krayem has been "temporarily handed over to Sweden to participate in the trial", which is scheduled to begin June 4, according to the Swedish Prosecution Authority.
"It is painful for my parents to be confronted with this event again, but we are grateful that the Swedish authorities want to give us justice," Jawdat al-Kasasbeh, the pilot's brother, told broadcaster Sveriges Radio.

CAMBRIDGE: The US State Department on Tuesday ordered the suspension of student visa processing, as President Donald Trump’s administration seeks unprecedented control of the nation’s universities by slashing funding and curbing international enrollment.
It is the latest escalation in the White House’s crackdown on foreign students, which has seen it revoke visas and deport some of those involved in protests against the war in Gaza.
A cable signed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio and seen by AFP orders embassies and consulates not to allow “any additional student or exchange visa... appointment capacity until further guidance is issued.”
The government plans to ramp up vetting of the social media profiles of international applicants to US universities, the cable said.
The New York Times reported that the suspension of interviews with visa applicants was temporary.
Rubio earlier rescinded hundreds of visas and the Trump administration has moved to bar Harvard University from admitting non-Americans.
Japan and Hong Kong have both urged local universities to accept foreign students from US universities in light of the crackdown.
China’s foreign ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning on Wednesday said Beijing urged Washington to “safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of international students, including those from China.”
Hundreds of thousands of Chinese students attend US universities, long viewed by many in China as beacons of academic freedom and rigour.
The suspension of visa processing came as Harvard students protested on Tuesday after the government said it intended to cancel all remaining financial contracts, Trump’s latest attempt to force the institution to submit to unprecedented oversight.
A judge issued a restraining order pending a hearing on the matter scheduled for Thursday, the same day as the university’s commencement graduation ceremony for which thousands of graduating students and their families had gathered in Cambridge, Massachusetts near Boston.
The White House, meanwhile, doubled down in its offensive, saying that public money should go to vocational schools that train electricians and plumbers.
“The president is more interested in giving that taxpayer money to trade schools and programs and state schools where they are promoting American values, but most importantly, educating the next generation based on skills that we need in our economy and our society,” Karoline Leavitt said on Fox News Tuesday evening. “We need more of those in our country, and less LGBTQ graduate majors from Harvard University.”
Tuesday’s protest unfolded as news helicopters hovered overhead and graduating students in academic attire and their guests ate finger food at a reception on the lawns of Harvard Square nearby.
“All my international friends and peers and professors and researchers are at risk and (are) threatened with being deported — or their option is to transfer” to another university, said Alice Goyer, who attended the protest wearing a black academic gown.
One history of medicine student from Britain graduating this week who gave his name only as Jack said that the policies pursued by Trump would make US universities less attractive to international students.
“I don’t know if I’d pursue a PhD here, six years is a long time,” he said.
Harvard itself has filed extensive legal challenges against Trump’s measures, which legal experts say are likely to be overturned by the courts.
Separately, alumni plan to file a lawsuit against Trump on June 9, filmmaker Anurima Bhargava told a virtual meeting staged by Crimson Courage, a grassroots alumni group that held a mass webinar to raise awareness and a fighting fund from former students.


The cutting of contracts announced Tuesday — estimated by US media to be worth $100 million — would mark the slashing of business ties between the government and the country’s oldest university.
Amid a broad campaign against seats of learning that Trump accuses of being hotbeds of liberal bias and anti-Semitism, the president has singled out Harvard.
In the last few weeks, the elite educational and research powerhouse has seen billions of dollars in federal grants frozen and millions of dollars of federal contracts torn up.
The university has sued both to block the revocation of its right to recruit and sponsor foreign students, 27 percent of its total roll, as well as to overturn the withdrawal of federal funding.
A legal expert suggested Harvard could file a lawsuit to overturn the latest contract cuts as part of existing legal action.
“The case is so strong that the court system is not going to step to the side and allow this... to go forward,” said Albany Law School professor Ray Brescia.
He said the Trump administration’s assault on Harvard was so flawed that a higher court would likely strike down the campaign if the Trump administration were to challenge it on appeal.
On Monday, Trump nonetheless vowed he would prevail in the increasingly public struggle, claiming that foreign students at Harvard include “radicalized lunatics, troublemakers.”
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