By IRNA
London : The British government has been forced to amend its early prisoner release scheme to ease jail overcrowding following reports of two men convicted of terrorism-related offences being freed under the programme.
Yassin Nassari, convicted of possessing documents likely to be useful to a terrorist, was said to have served just over seven months of a three-and-a-half year sentence when he was released in February from a maximum security prison in Wakefield.
In January, 17-year-old Abdul Muneem Patel was also freed after serving three months of a six-month sentence at a young offenders’ institution in Leicester. He was arrested after an explosives manual was found at his home in east London.
Hours after the reports on Friday, Justice Secretary Jack Straw announced a change to the rules of the so-called end of custody licence (ECL) release programme, brought in last year allowing any “non-dangerous” inmates to be freed up to 18 days early.
“In the light of these cases the justice secretary has decided to change the criteria for the ECL scheme so that any prisoner convicted under terrorism legislation would not be eligible,” a spokesman for the Ministry of Justice said.
News of the convicted terrorists serving less than half of their sentences was criticised by the Liberal Democrats as showing a “huge discrepancy” between the government’s rhetoric on terrorism and its actions.
“Next week ministers will bring before parliament unnecessary and draconian legislation on pre-charge detention in a desperate attempt to look tough on terrorism,” the party’s justice spokesman Chris Huhne said.
“People convicted of terrorist offences can be back in society having served less than half their sentence because of our desperately overstretched prison system,” he said.