‘FREE Babar Ahmad,’ Babar’s father Ashfaq Ahmad told supporters outside the High Court in central London yesterday, ‘if Babar is extradited to America then a lot more people will face the same treatment.’
Mr Ahmad was speaking to a crowd of over 100 family, friends and supporters of his son, who is appealing against being extradited to the United States under the Extradition Act.
Babar Ahmad is a British citizen who was born in London in 1974. He grew up and went to school in South London, where he had been living until his arrest on 5th August 2004.
Mr Ahmad continued: ‘If they send Babar out they will have to book two tickets because I’m going too.
‘If Babar goes it will be the beginning of the campaign, not the end.’
The appeal hearing began yesterday and will continue until Friday with the verdict expected in two to three weeks.
Moassem Begg, ex-Guantanamo Bay detainee, told the rally outside the High Court yesterday: ‘Babar is facing being taken to a place where he can expect no justice.
‘The legal eagles may say that Babar will be treated within the law. But he won’t.
‘Once you are in the hands of an oppressor the law does not apply.
‘In the US the atmosphere of fear has reached paranoid levels.
‘If Babar Ahmad is sent to America he will receive no justice.’
Hugo Charlton from the Campaign Against Criminalising Communities, said: ‘The Extradition Act 2003 was passed through Parliament in a hurry and received insufficient scrutiny.
‘This treaty means people can be taken to prison with no examination of the evidence against them. No prima facie case needs to be framed. This is very dangerous legislation for us all.’
Yvonne Ridley, from Stop Political Terror, said: ‘No other country in the world would sign up to this one-way treaty.
‘And no other leader in the world would dare betray his people the way Blair has done.
‘This is an injustice not just to Babar Ahmad but to every single British citizen who is now exposed to this one-sided extradition treaty.
‘We are the only country in the world to have signed up to it. Tony Blair has betrayed the trust of every UK citizen.’
George Galloway MP said: ‘Blair has betrayed the British people in his slave-like obeisance to the US, in defiance of the entire world community and in defiance of the Geneva Conventions.
like this for years,’ he said, pointing to a caged and shackled man outside the High Court.
Galloway continued: ‘The Bagram Airbase where men are held upside-down in water tanks until they think they are drowning, and where very possibly some have been drowned – that is US justice.’
