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Cleric’s plea for UK hostage
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We have the quite unbelievable sight of radical cleric Abu Qatada
speaking from Full Sutton High Security prison straight to camera as we have
never seen him before, pleading for the life of the British hostage in
Iraq, Norman Kember.

Heaven knows how this was conjured up. It has been suggested in the
past that British intelligence tolerated Qatada's radical preaching
because it enabled them to keep in touch with people who they were interested
in.

Whether that relationship extended to persuading the cleric to
intercede on Britain's behalf to save a British citizen, we don't know, but the
very idea of a man detained effectively without trial for opaque
charges connected with terrorism then being asked to participate in UK
diplomacy seems to be a novel turn.

UK role in terrorist rendition
================================

Jonathan Miller reports on the increasingly murky tale of Britain's
involvement in the transport of American-held terror suspects. This is a
story that threatens to get very seriously out of hand if the Blair
government can't hose it down.

The PM's efforts at PMQs today were not entirely persuasive. Charles
Kennedy is out of his quarters at the Liberal Democrat parliamentary base
to pursue the PM with very specific questions. We will be talking to Mr
Kennedy tonight.

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Lord Steyn on Guantanamo and "extraordinary rendition"