Court rules cleric’s extradition to US
STRASBOURG - The Associated Press
Britain can extradite a radical Muslim cleric and four other suspects to the United States to face terrorism charges, Europe’s human rights court ruled yesterday.The case centering on Mustafa Kamal Mustafa, also known as Abu Hamza al-Masri, considered Britain’s most recognizable extremist, has been closely watched as a sign of Europe’s view on tough U.S. prisons. The court said Britain would not violate EU human rights rules by extraditing the suspects, who could face life sentences in a maximum-security prison.
Al-Masri and the other suspects had argued that in the U.S. they could face prison conditions and jail terms that would expose them to “torture or inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment” in breach of the European human rights code. The European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, France, rejected those claims, saying in a ruling yesterday that “detention conditions and length of sentences of five alleged terrorists would not amount to ill-treatment if they were extradited to the US.”
