A witnesss testifying against a man on trial for murdering a young dad has been accused of inciting the fatal attack.

Emirjan Hysaj, 34, of no fixed address, is accused of beating 31-year-old father-of-two Kalvinder ‘Bob’ Singh to death with a plank in a Cheetham Hill takeaway back in April 2004.

Mr Hysaj was among a group of Albanians who became involved in a late night race row with Bob Singh's friends after a night out in the city centre.

One of the Albanians, identified only as Mr Kula, agreed to give evidence against Hysaj from behind a screen.

He has told the jury that he saw Emirjan Hysaj hit Bob Singh with a stick before another man, Alfred Kurti, stamped on his head.

On Wednesday Maura McGowan, Mr Hysaj’s defence counsel, accused Mr Kula of putting the blame on Mr Hysaj to keep himself out of trouble and win the right to stay in the country.

Ms McGowan put to Mr Hysaj that the row had started after he and another Albanian, Alfred Kurti, were told by one of the ‘white men’ in Bob Singh’s group that they ‘weren’t good enough to look at them and must look at the ground’.

Ms McGowan then told Mr Kula that he had responded by saying ‘you don’t know who you’re f***ing with, I have killed people in the war in my country, I’ve murdered people.’

When the men laughed at him Mr Kula called them ‘white bastards’ before being dragged outside and assaulted by them.

The witness denied that he had been angered by the fracas and denied the barrister’s claim that he had summoned others including Emirjan to the scene as ‘reinforcements’, armed them with planks, and told them to go back and ‘punish’ Bob Singh’s group.

Mr Kula said he was ‘telling the truth’ when he said that he had witnessed the attack from outside the takeaway, later describing how ‘there are a lot of consequences’ for Albanians who give evidence against their countrymen to the police. But Ms McGowan said: “You have lied to get yourself out of trouble, you have lied to put the blame on somebody who was not a friend or a family member.

"You were never prosecuted for this were you? So, having been involved in this incident in April 2004, not having permission to stay in this country, you have gone from that to being a witness and you now have permission to stay in the country.”

Speaking of his application for leave to remain in Britain, Mr Kula replied, ‘the decision was taken a long time ago.’

Later, Wayne Sykes, a boyhood friend of Bob Singh’s who suffered a fractured skull in the same incident, described the moment the attackers stormed the takeaway.

Chopper

He said: “I jumped on the counter, I turned round and asked the staff of the Burning Balti to give me a chopper, next thing I remember was waking up in hospital.”

Marjan Semaj was convicted of murder in 2005 in connection with Bob Singh’s death while Alfred Kurti is still being sought by police.

Earlier this week Artan Hysaj, also 34, of no fixed abode, went on trial for murder alongside Emirjan Hysaj, but that case against him has been dropped after the Crown offered no evidence.

Emirjan Hysaj denies murder and causing grievous bodily harm to Wayne Sykes.

Artan Hysaj has admitted violent disorder.

Proceeding