Free Gary McKinnon

The BBC reports:on the case of British terrorist sespect Haroon Rashid Aswat

Last Updated: Thursday, 5 January 2006, 11:47 GMT

Briton facing extradition to US

Mr Aswat was initially detained in Lusaka jail in Zambia
A British terror suspect can be extradited to the US, a judge at Bow Street Magistrates court has ruled.

US authorities say Haroon Rashid Aswat, 31, tried to set up a camp in Oregon between 1999 and 2000 to train people to fight in Afghanistan.

Home Secretary Charles Clarke has up to two months to approve the extradition of Mr Aswat, of Dewsbury, Yorkshire.

Mr Aswat, who denies the charges, was deported from Zambia in August after he was arrested and held in Lusaka jail.

Why was he deported to the UK rather than directly to the USA ?

It seems that the District Judge Timothy Workman has repeated his judgement stemming from the Babar Ahmad case., which may set a precedent for the Gary McKinnon and other pending cases.

Last month the court heard that the terror suspect could go to Guantanamo Bay if extradited.

And a US legal expert had told the court that there was an "overwhelming risk" of the Briton being subjected to special measures such as solitary confinement.

However, Mr Workman said the court had received a diplomatic note from the US Embassy in London last month.

The note gave assurances that Mr Aswat would be "prosecuted before a federal court in accordance with the full panoply of rights and protections that would otherwise be provided to a defendant facing similar charges".

And it said that the Briton would not be prosecuted by a military commission or treated as an enemy combatant.

Mr Workman said: "Whilst the note does not provide any personal protection to this defendant I am satisfied that it does bind the government of the United States of America which in these terms includes the president."

The judge also rejected claims that evidence against Mr Aswat came from an al-Qaeda suspect and had been obtained by the threat of inhuman treatment against that suspect.

Mr Workman said the issue of whether that evidence was admissible or not was for a trial court in the United States to decidehttp://www.cnn.com/2003/LAW/04/14/Ujaama.plea/" target="_cnn

This shows the full stupidity of the Extradition Act 2003 in action. Why couldn't this British jusdge have heard some prima facie evidence at least ?

The US authorities have accused Mr Aswat of conspiracy to provide material support for terrorism in the US between 1999 and 2000.

They claim he and another man helped to set up a camp in Bly, Oregon, to train people to "fight jihad" in Afghanistan

The "other man" is, of course, the notorious Abu "The Hook" Hamza al Masri, who was arrested on similar charges, until the UK authorities decided to charge him with vague UK conspiracy and incitement offences onstead.

Pne has to wonder why the US authorities did not let any such alleged training camp to actually start to get established, where they could easily keep the people involved under surrveillance rather better than in say Afghanistan. The nearest any of the alleged "plotters" seem to have got was to view a few pitrntial farm properties, but not to actually set up camp or obtain any weapons etc.

As with Babar Ahmad, raising money or providing moral support for the Taleban circa 1999 to 2000 was not illegal in the United Kingdom, and, astonishingly, the Taleban , even today, is still not a proscribed terrorist organisation in the UK, membership or support for which would be a crime in the UK.