Kosovo court hands prison sentence to man who joined IS

PRISTINA, Kosovo – A Kosovo court has sentenced an Albanian man to three years imprisonment for joining the Islamic State group.

The court of Gjilan, 50 kilometers (30 miles) south-east of the capital Pristina, on Thursday jailed a young Albanian identified as F.B. for joining the group, which it said has been designated a terrorist organization by the United Nations.

He was arrested in January at Kosovo's international airport together with a friend after returning from fighting with IS.

A court statement emailed to The Associated Press Friday said F.B. joined IS in February last year and was "trained in theory and practice on using the AK-47 automatic rifle and hand grenades."

A few hundred Kosovo-born volunteers have gone to join the Islamic State group in Syria and Iraq, mainly passing through Turkey.