Judge rules terror suspects can claim compensation

LABOUR’S anti-terrorism strategy was thrown into chaos last night after terror suspects were given the green light to claim compensation for human rights violations.

The judgment paves the way for terror suspects to claim damages against Home Secretary Johnson The judgment paves the way for ­terror suspects to claim damages against Home Secretary Johnson

In a landmark High Court ruling, Mr Justice Silber quashed control orders imposed on two suspects alleged to have links with Islamic terrorists.

The men, identified only as AF and AE, argued the orders made against them in 2006 were unlawful.

Neither man has ever stood trial. The judgment paves the way for ­terror suspects, such as radical cleric Abu Qatada to claim damages against Home Secretary Alan Johnson for human rights violations.

Critics warned that Britain was “no safer” because of Labour’s anti-terror laws and called for control orders to be scrapped. Tory home affairs and counter-­terrorism spokesman Crispin Blunt said: “We have warned the Government many times that control orders are not working. “

And former Shadow Home Secretary David Davis said: “Whilst I believe that control orders are ill-conceived, and both draconian and ineffective in their actions, the idea that subjects should be awarded compensation is in my judgment entirely wrong.” A defiant Mr Johnson said he was “disappointed” by the judgment and would be mounting an appeal.

Both of the terror suspects were electronically tagged, placed under curfew and a series of other restrictions were imposed which limited their use of the internet and ability to meet and communicate with others.

The two detainees and a third man won a ground-breaking judgment in the House of Lords last June that they were each entitled to “be told sufficient of the case against him to enable him to challenge that case”.

AF was born in 1981 in Derby and has dual Libyan and British nationality. He was subjected to control orders because of alleged links with Islamic terrorists. AE was described in court as imam to the Iraqi community in an unnamed town in the north of England.

It was alleged by the security service there was evidence that he had received terrorist training and taken part in terrorist activities.

Last June, the House of Lords ruled the control orders against both men were unfair because they were largely based on secret intelligence kept from them. Nine Law Lords unanimously judged that the men were entitled to see enough of the secret intelligence information against them to instruct their defence lawyers.

Following the ruling, Mr Johnson revoked the orders against both AF and AE, and did not seek to renew them because it would have involved disclosing hitherto secret intelligence material. Yesterday, despite the Home Secretary’s opposition, the High Court said the orders must not only be revoked but quashed with retrospective effect.

The decision effectively gives the go-ahead for damages claims for loss of liberty and alleged human rights violations dating back to 2006, when the orders were first imposed. But the judge warned that the claims were not bound to succeed, and the level of compensation payable was “low”.

Mohammed Ayub, of Chambers solicitors in Bradford, who was acting for AE, said: “It cannot be right to impose a control order on a person for three and a half years and, at the end of that period, without any evidence having been disclosed to AE, to say ‘We have decided to revoke the control order and you have no effective remedy for the wrong that we have done to you’.”

CONTROL ORDERS  allow the Home Secretary to impose restrictions on anyone suspected of involvement in any terrorism-related activity.

THE RESTRICTIONS can include house curfews for up to 16 hours a day; control of internet and phone access; electronic tagging; travel bans; and bans on associating with specified people.

THE orders were brought in as part of the Prevention of Terrorism Act in March 2005 after the House of Lords ruled that locking up terror suspects without charge or trial in jails such as Belmarsh, pictured, was in breach of their human rights.

The system of control orders was designed to allow the Home Secretary to restrict suspects’ movement where it was claimed a trial was not possible.

THE HOME SECRETARY applies to the court for an order on the basis of public or “open” evidence and secret “closed” intelligence collected by police and MI5.

BREACHING an order is a criminal offence punishable by up to five years in prison.

THERE ARE currently 12 people, including nine British citizens, under control orders. At the last count, 45 individuals had been subject to the orders at some point.

CIVIL LIBERTIES groups argue that the orders undermine the presumption of innocence and breach human rights. Critics also question their effectiveness.A series of court rulings has undermined the regime, leading some to suggest it is “withering on the vine”.

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