A High Court judge's comment wishing "all the best" to Haroon Aswat has prompted outrage as the al-Qaeda-linked defendant prepares to leave a psychiatric hospital and return to live with family in Batley, West Yorkshire.
Sir Robert Jay made the remark during a hearing at London's Royal Courts of Justice, telling Aswat, "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." The exchange is recorded in a court transcript obtained by The Sun.
Aswat, 50, is held at Bethlem Royal Hospital in south London and is reported to have completed the sentence imposed in the United States after pleading guilty to terrorism offences. He was deported to Britain in 2022. Despite objections from counterterrorism officers, officials have said a legal restriction that limits surveillance powers over psychiatric patients has so far prevented GPS monitoring or an ankle tag on Aswat.
Metropolitan Police counterterrorism officials told the court that probation service staff declined to carry out a risk assessment because rules bar such checks on people in psychiatric care. Detective Chief Superintendent Gareth Rees of the Met's Counter Terrorism Command told the court, "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."
Aswat trained in al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan prior to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and is reported to have helped the radical preacher Abu Hamza al-Masri establish a training camp in Oregon in 1999. U.S. investigators found his name in documents recovered from a Pakistani safehouse used by Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the chief planner of the 9/11 attacks, according to court papers. He was linked by investigators to the July 7, 2005, London bombings after police traced some 20 calls made by the suicide bombers to a phone connected with him, although he was never charged over that attack.
British court records say Aswat was arrested in Zambia weeks after the 2005 attacks carrying a terror manual and suspected bomb-making materials. He fought extradition from the U.K. to the U.S. for nearly a decade on mental health grounds before being sent to the United States in 2014. He pleaded guilty to terrorism charges in 2015 and received a 20-year sentence that was later reduced to seven years to reflect time spent in British custody.
While in U.S. custody, court papers say, Aswat made admissions in which he did not deny being a terrorist and claimed involvement in major attacks; U.S. authorities objected to his early release. A British government source said Aswat had completed his sentence but remained under psychiatric care. The source said he would be subject to "robust monitoring" for 30 years, though police and counterterrorism officials have expressed frustration that some legal limits restrict electronic tagging and probation risk assessments for patients being discharged from secure hospitals.
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."
The hearing was Aswat's first public appearance since his return to Britain. His case highlights tensions between public safety measures and legal protections for people receiving psychiatric treatment. Security officials told the court they remained concerned about Aswat's statements praising al-Qaeda and about a potential desire to reconnect with extremist networks, while lawyers and mental health advocates have emphasised legal limits on monitoring and the role of treatment plans in managing risk.
The July 7, 2005, suicide bombings targeted three London Underground trains and a bus, killing 52 people and injuring hundreds. Aswat's links to Islamist militancy and his presence on documents recovered in counterterrorism investigations have made his prospective discharge a focal point for debate over how the U.K. manages individuals convicted overseas of terrorism offences who later receive psychiatric care on return to Britain.
Authorities say operational decisions about tagging, surveillance and risk management will be driven by law and clinical assessments, and that police and intelligence services retain powers they can deploy when lawful and necessary to protect the public.