A Dutch court today sentenced the self-confessed murderer of Dutch film-maker Theo van Gogh to life imprisonment.

Mohammed Bouyeri, 27, mounted no defence at his two-day trial earlier this month for the murder of Van Gogh, whom he accused of insulting Islam, and told the court he would do it again if given the chance.

The murder on November 2 last year heightened religious and racial tensions in the Netherlands and raised concerns about home-grown Islamist terrorism.

Prosecutors demanded a life sentence for Bouyeri, who shot, stabbed and nearly beheaded Van Gogh with a kitchen knife. Witnesses said that they saw him coolly commit the murder on a busy Amsterdam street during the morning rush hour. A photograph exhibited in court showed a figure identified as Bouyeri walking away from the scene.

Bouyeri was arrested after a gun battle with police with Van Gogh's blood on his clothes.

Today, presiding judge Udo Willem Bentinck said life was the only fitting punishment for a crime that sought to undermine Dutch democracy and the political system.

Bouyeri, wearing a black and white checked headscarf, showed no emotion as he shook his lawyer's hand following the verdict. He had earlier told the court he had intended to die in the action and become a martyr to his faith.

The judge said the three-judge panel had concluded there was no possibility for Bouyeri to return to society, citing his lack of remorse and the unlikelihood he would ever change his radical views.

The killing was considered an act of terrorism by the authorities because Van Gogh was a prominent critic of Muslim fundamentalism. Bouyeri had left a five-page note filled with religious texts fixed to the film-maker's body with a knife.

During the trial, Bouyeri told the court: "I did it out of conviction ... If I ever get free, I would do it again."

At the earlier hearing he turned around in his chair and spoke to Anneke van Gogh, Theo's mother, who was sitting in the public gallery. "I don't feel your pain," he said. "I have to admit I don't have any sympathy for you. I can't feel for you because I think you're a non-believer."

Van Gogh had received death threats after the release last year of a 10-minute film called Submission, which dealt with violence against women in Islamic societies. It portrayed four abused and naked women wearing transparent dresses and with verses from the Qu'ran that are unfavourable to women painted on their bodies.