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Decks cleared for Hamza’s extradition

LONDON: Decks were cleared on Wednesday for Abu Hamza al-Masri, one of Britain’s most controversial Muslim clerics, to be extradited to America after he was refused leave to appeal to House of Lords.

His lawyers indicated they planned to take the case to the European Court of Human Rights. The 49-year-old Egyptian-born Hamza, who is serving a seven-year jail sentence for inciting murder and racial hatred, is wanted in America on terror charges.

These include funding terrorism, organising a training camp in Oregon between 1998 and 2000, and conspiring to take 12 westerners hostage in Yemen in 1998.

Hamza’s extradition was approved by Home Secretary Jacqui Smith in February after a court rejected his appeal, in which he had argued American authorities had obtained evidence against him through torture and it was therefore not admissible. Hamza was arrested in 2004 for inciting ‘jihad’ and was convicted in 2006. He denied the charges, claiming he was encouraging Muslims to stand up for their rights.

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