Omar Karmi

Foreign Correspondent

LONDON // Two men charged with the gruesome murder of a British soldier on a London street in broad daylight pleaded not guilty yesterday.

Michael Adebolajo, 28, and Michael Adebowale, 22, are accused of killing Lee Rigby near his barracks in the London Woolwich area on May 22.

Rigby, a 25-year-old father of one, died from multiple cut and stab wounds.

The aftermath of the killing was captured by passers-by in cellphone footage that showed the two men, one covered in blood and holding a butcher knife, claim the killing as revenge for the murder of Muslims by the British military in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The men, both British-born converts to Islam, also pleaded not guilty to conspiring to kill a police officer and separate charges of attempting to murder a police officer.

They appeared in court via video-link from separate cells in the high-security Belmarsh Prison.

Both Adebolajo and Adebowale asked to be known by their Muslim names: Mujahid Abu Hamzeh and Ismail Ibn Abdullah respectively.

Members of Rigby’s family, including his widow Rebecca, were in attendance at the hearing at the Old Bailey criminal court in central London.

A trial is scheduled for November 18.

okarmi@thenational.ae