A London-based preacher who last week defended the Charlie Hebdo shootings, and has called for gay people to be killed, said it is an ‘act of war’ for UK shops to stock the satirical magazine.

Last week, gunmen killed twelve people, after attacking the offices of Charlie Hebdo, a satirical French magazine that famously published a cartoon of a gay Muslim kiss.

Responding on USA Today, London preacher Anjem Choudary defended the murders, and appeared to blame the French Government for “allowing” the magazine to publish them images, “thereby placing the sanctity of its citizens at risk?”

The magazine was released today, despite last week’s massacre, and printed 3 million copies, rather than the usual circulation of tens of thousands.

Several UK newsagents announced that they would stock limited numbers of the magazine, which features the Prophet Mohammed holding a sign reading “Je Suis Charlie”.

Choudary responded, equated “ridiculing” the Prophet to attacking him personally. He said publishing the magazine were “extremely serious”, and called the sale of the magazines an “act of war”, which would be punishable by death in a Shariah court.

“It’s not just a cartoon, it’s insulting, it’s ridiculing, it’s provoking,” he continued.

He added: “These things always have a history of coming back and biting them. People are not going to forget. Muslims will never forget what these people did.

“And I’m sure there’s someone somewhere who will take the law into his own hands. It’s inevitable.

“There will be repercussions. I think there will be someone somewhere who will retaliate.”

France sold out of the magazines, and the print run has been extended by a further two million to 5,000,000.

The 47-year-old is the former UK head of the Islamist group al-Muhajiroun or Islam4UK, banned in the UK in 2010.

He suggested at a press conference in 2009 that gay people should be stoned to death, and was last year arrested alongside eight other men on suspicion of membership of a banned organisation.,