A man who burned a copy of the Quran outside the Turkish consulate in London has had his acquittal upheld by the High Court.
It marked a landmark ruling that campaigners say decisively rejects any attempt to reintroduce blasphemy laws through the back door.
Hamit Coskun, a 51-year-old asylum seeker from Turkey of Armenian-Kurdish descent, was initially convicted in June 2025 at Westminster Magistrates’ Court of a religiously aggravated public order offence under section 5 of the Public Order Act 1986.
The charge arose from a solo protest on February 13, 2025, in Rutland Gardens, Knightsbridge, where he set fire to the Islamic text while shouting “F*ck Islam”, “Islam is the religion of terrorism” and “Quran is burning”.
The conviction was overturned on appeal in October 2025.
“There is no offence of blasphemy in our law. Burning a Koran may be an act that many Muslims find desperately upsetting and offensive,” the judge stated.
“The criminal law, however, is not a mechanism that seeks to avoid people being upset, even grievously upset. The right to freedom of expression, if it is a right worth having, must include the right to express views that offend, shock or disturb,” he added.
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) sought to challenge that acquittal at the High Court.
Today, that court dismissed the appeal, stating: “We are not persuaded that the court left any material factor out of account or relied on any immaterial factor.”
It added that the lower court’s conclusions were “rationally open to the court” and that behaviour could be disorderly and likely to cause harassment, alarm or distress yet still not criminal if deemed reasonable.
The National Secular Society welcomed the decision. Founded in 1866, the organisation campaigns for a “freer, fairer, more tolerant society”.
A spokesperson for the group said: “The High Court has rightly rejected this wrongheaded attempt to introduce a blasphemy law by the back door. However offensive some may have found the Koran-burning protest, it was lawful.
“Criminal law protects people from harm, not from being offended.”
The Free Speech Union has called for the Director of Public Prosecutions, Stephen Parkinson, to resign in light of the “humiliating defeat”. The Union is a UK-based membership organisation, founded in 2020 by journalist Toby Young, which campaigns for freedom of speech.
Young, general secretary of the Free Speech Union, said: “This appeal should never have been brought by the Crown Prosecution Service, just as Hamit should never have been prosecuted.”
Humanists UK also hailed the outcome, noting that blasphemy laws were repealed in England and Wales in 2008 and that the ruling reaffirms they have not returned. The group is a charitable organisation which promotes secular humanism and aims to represent non-religious people in the UK.
It has long warned that prosecutions perceived as targeting blasphemy encourage extremism and violence, pointing out that Coskun himself was attacked with a knife during the protest, with his assailant later spared jail.
The CPS confirmed it would not pursue the matter further, with a spokesperson stating: “There is no law to prosecute people for ‘blasphemy’, and burning a religious text on its own is not a criminal offence.
“Our case was always that Hamit Coskun’s words, choice of location and burning of the Quran amounted to disorderly behaviour and that at the time he demonstrated hostility towards a religious group.
“The High Court has made a ruling we will review its decision carefully.”
This is a great relief and victory for free speech in Britain. Coskun, a dissident who burned a Koran and was stabbed, was then prosecuted for his expression; incredibly, some in Britain suggested he’d “asked for it” by inciting violence against himself. When a court disagreed,… https://t.co/EAJDeDwPye
— Under Secretary of State Sarah B. Rogers (@UnderSecPD) February 27, 2026
