Haroon Aswat who has been linked to the 2005 atrocity which took the lives of 52 people and to a part in the New York’s 9/11 attack which killed almost 3,000 people will soon be free
An al-Qaeda terrorist said to have claimed to be the mastermind of the 7/7 London bombings has been wished “all the best” by a British judge as he gets set to walk free.
Haroon Aswat reportedly confessed to prison inmates his part in the 2005 atrocity which took the lives of 52 people and to a part in the New York’s 9/11 attack which killed almost 3,000 people, when he was serving a 20-year sentence in the US after he admitted conspiring to set up a terrorist training camp in Oregon.
Aswat was deported to the UK in 2022 and detained under the Mental Health Act, but is set to leave a secure mental hospital and live with his family in Batley, West Yorkshire.
Met police’s top terror officer Det Chief Supt Gareth Rees has “grave concerns” that Aswat remains a threat to security according to court papers and as recently as April, Aswat, now 50, appeared in front of Sir Robert Jay at the High Court.
A transcript of the High Court case held on April 1, and obtained by the Sun revealed police had applied for a notification order to keep tabs on Aswat, but a legal loophole bans checks on psychiatric patients so he won’t even be monitored by an ankle tag.
In his witness statement Det Chief Supt Rees said of Aswat: “He has spoken positively of his time with al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and expressed aspirations to reconnect with them. Based on my experience, this is conduct which gives me grave concerns about the risk which the defendant poses to the UK’s national security and to the public.”
During the hearing Mr Justice Jay asks him: “Mr Aswat, is there anything you’d like to say? How are you feeling?”
Aswat replied: “I’m good.” Mr Justice Jay: “OK. You feel stable on your treatment?” Aswat: “Yes.”
Mr Justice Jay: “When you are released, you are going to go back to your family, I think?” Aswat: “In Yorkshire, yes.”
Mr Justice Jay: “OK. And you understand what these requirements are?” Aswat: “I have read through all the paperwork, yes.”
Mr Justice Jay: “OK. You probably want to put all of this behind you now?” Aswat: “Indeed, I do.”
Mr Justice Jay added: “It could not have been too pleasant being in American custody all that time. I have to wish you all the best and say to you that the way forward is to keep on your medication, listen to the advice you are going to get, and keep out of the sort of things you were doing. Because you saw where it ended up and you do not want to go back to that, I am sure.”
Aswat’s High Court hearing was the first time he has appeared in public since he returned from the US where he pleaded guilty to “incredibly serious” terror offences. After being deported to the UK in 2022 he has been held at Bethlem Royal Hospital in South London.
Aswat was never charged over 7/7 even though police traced 20 calls to a phone linked to him made by the suicide bombers. Weeks after the attack he was arrested in Zambia while possessing a terror manual and suspected bomb parts. He was deported to the UK and held under a US arrest warrant.
A Government spokeswoman said: “If any individual poses a threat to national security the police and intelligence services have a range of powers they can apply. We will always do whatever is necessary inside the law to protect the public from any risk posed by former terrorist offenders or people of terrorist concern.”
Mr Justice Jay has been approached for comment (via email at 9.30am)