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After an eight-year misery, Abu Rideh was offered a "certificate of travel" by the Home Office to travel outside Britain. |
CAIRO – Locked for years behind the bars of high-security prisons and the walls of his house, a new hope is shining for Palestinian refugee Mahmoud Abu Rideh to rebuild a devastated life.
"Mahmoud Abu Rideh will now be able to leave the UK and seek entry to a safe country," Sarah Macneice, counter-terrorism campaigner, said in a statement posted on Amnesty International UK website.
The 37-year-old was offered a "certificate of travel" by the Home Office to travel outside Britain.
"[He] will no longer be subjected to the repressive measures of his Control Order, which have driven him to utter desperation," said Macneice.
Abu Rideh was arrested following the 9/11 attacks on terror suspicions and sent behind bars.
Though he was never charged or tried, Abu Rideh was held in Belmarsh heavy-security prison before being moved to Broadmoor prison.
As his health conditions deteriorated, he was released and kept under house arrest under a control order.
"This decision has given him real hope that he may now be reunited with his wife and children, and be able to rebuild his life," Macneice said.
The Home Office offer follows a long legal battle with the Home Ministry at the High Court, backed by Amnesty International.
Last month, the UK Law Lords ruled unanimously that people have the right to know the information used against them to impose Control Orders.
Repressive
Welcoming the Home Office offer, Amnesty renewed calls for halting all repressive measures, including the Control Orders.
"This is a minor victory for one man, but the pernicious system of Control Orders, which has driven him and his family out of the UK, remains in place," Macneice said.
"Amnesty continues to call for an end to the Control Order regime and its replacement with measures which respect people's basic human rights."
The system of control orders, applied within Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005, allows the government to impose severe restrictions on people suspected of involvement in terrorism-related activity.
The system relies on secret material which is not disclosed to the people affected by the Order or their lawyers.
Under this system, all suspects were denied the right to know the basis of their detention, thus preventing them from mounting an effective challenge to the Orders.
Amnesty vowed to continue efforts for Abu Rideh be issued with a UN travel document, to which he should be entitled as a refugee.
"Amnesty is supporting Mahmoud Abu Rideh's application for a UN travel document, to which he should be entitled as a refugee," Macneice said.
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