Strasbourg to rule on Abu Hamza extradition

Published on 10/04/2012 01:24

Human rights judges will rule today on whether to allow the government to extradite radical preacher Abu Hamza to the United States to face terrorist charges.

The Muslim cleric, serving a seven-year sentence in Britain for soliciting to murder and inciting racial hatred, has become the focus of growing concern over human rights rulings from Strasbourg, which ministers claim could compromise national security.

The European Court of Human Rights halted extradition proceedings in July 2010, arguing it needed more time to consider complaints that transferring Abu Hamza and others wanted in the US risked breaching their rights by exposing them to possible life imprisonment without parole and solitary confinement.

Today, the judges will give a final ruling on six extradition cases in a verdict effectively passing judgment on whether America’s treatment of terrorist suspects could amount to “inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment” in breach of the European human rights code.

Egyptian-born Abu Hamza was granted British citizenship in 1986. He is wanted in the US on 11 charges related to taking 16 hostages in Yemen in 1998, promoting violent jihad in Afghanistan in 2001 and conspiring to set up a jihad training camp in Oregon, US.

The US authorities have described him as a “terrorist facilitator with a global reach”.

But before the US extradition request could be dealt with, Abu Hamza had been convicted in 2006 of terrorist-related charges in Britain.

Among those facing extradition alongside him is Babar Ahmad, a 36-year-old computer expert who has been in a UK prison without trial for nearly eight years.

He has been refused bail since his arrest in August 2004 on a US extradition warrant.