THE TELEGRAPH: The leader of a terrorist cell planning an attack on Easter shoppers in Manchester cannot be deported back to Pakistan in case he is tortured, a tribunal has ruled.
Police did not find any explosives when they swooped on the cell in April last year, but MI5 has maintained that the men, all students from Pakistan, were “members of a UK based network linked to al-Qaeda involved in attack planning.”
The Special Immigration and Appeals Commission said it was satisfied Abid Naseer, the alleged ring-leader, was behind an “imminent” al-Qaeda backed plot but said he risked being tortured if he was returned to Pakistan. >>> Duncan Gardham, Security Correspondent | Tuesday, May 18, 2010
TELEGRAPH BLOG – PHILIP JOHNSTON: We may have a new government but we have the same old problem with alleged foreign terrorists – we can’t deport them because of their human rights.
A tribunal has ruled that Abid Naseer, the alleged ring-leader of a plot to carry out terrorist attacks in the north-west of England last year, cannot be removed to his Pakistan homeland because he might be tortured.
The tribunal accepted that Naseer is an al-Qaeda operative and was behind an “imminent” plot to target a shopping centre in Manchester at Easter 2009.
Neither Naseer nor any of the others, who had come to Britain on student visas, was charged but the Home Office wanted to deport them on national security grounds. Eight of them have returned to Pakistan but Naseer and another man have stayed and have both won the right not to be deported. Read on and comment >>> Philip Johnston | Tuesday, May 18, 2010
