European countries can turn away people involved in a terrorist network | Erwin Scheriau/EPA Asylum seekers in terror networks aren’t refugees, EU’s top court rules Support for terrorist activities valid grounds for denying refugee status, the European court found.

European countries can reject asylum applications from people involved in a terrorist network, the European Court of Justice ruled Tuesday.

The ECJ decision relates to the case of Mostafa Lounani, a Moroccan national convicted in Belgium and sentenced to six years in prison in 2006 for his participation in the Belgian cell of the "Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group" terrorist organization.

Lounani applied for refugee status in 2010, claiming he feared persecution as a radical Islamist if he were returned to Moroccan authorities. Belgium rejected Louhani's application, a decision the Belgian Council for asylum and immigration proceedings then appealed. Lounani's actions, it said, could not be categorized as "acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations" because he had not personally committed terrorist acts.

The case was referred to the ECJ, which found Louhani's involvement in passport forgery and his assistance to jihadists traveling to Iraq constituted "logistical support to the activities" of a terrorist organization and thus justified his "exclusion from refugee status."

In its judgment, the Luxembourg-based court wrote the rules "cannot be confined to the actual perpetrators of terrorist acts, but can also extend to the persons who engage in activities of recruitment, organization, transportation or equipment of individuals" who plan, prepare or perpetrate a terror attack.

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