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Ashcroft questioned on death penalty

Ashcroft
Ashcroft said he had expressed his "deep appreciation" to the UK  


LONDON, England (CNN) -- U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft has not ruled out the possibility that terror suspects could face the death penalty if extradited from Europe to America.

Ashcroft, speaking at the U.S. Embassy in London following discussions with UK Home Secretary David Blunkett, said extraditions would be dealt with on a "case-by-case basis."

The British prime minister's office said on Monday that if Osama bin Laden was captured by British forces in Afghanistan, he would immediately be handed over to U.S. officials.

Downing Street made the statement a day after two British officials -- including Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon -- said the British government would extradite bin Laden for trial in the United States only if assurances were given that he would not face the death penalty.

Britain is just one of several European countries involved in the war on terror that have expressed concern over the use of the death penalty in the United States.

On Wednesday, France urged the United States to remove the threat of the death penalty for the first suspect indicted in the U.S. for conspiring with bin Laden on the September 11 attacks.

Justice Minister Marylise Lebranchu said France could not accept such a punishment for Zacarias Moussaoui, a Frenchman of Moroccan descent.

Moussaoui has been charged with conspiring with Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda to "murder thousands of people" in New York, Pennsylvania and at the Pentagon.

Asked at Wednesday's news conference whether he was willing to give a guarantee that terrorist suspects who were extradited to the US would not face capital punishment, Ashcroft said: "It is clear that the United States, most of the states in the United States and the federal government of the United States, have laws, the violation of which provides death eligibility in terms of the sentencing.

"We deal with this on a case-by-case basis. Individuals and nations with which we have dealt regarding extraditions have dealt on a case-by-case basis and I think that is the best way to go forward."

Ashcroft was asked if Lotfi Raissi, the Algerian pilot linked by authorities to one of the suspected September 11 hijackers, would be extradited from Britain.

Ashcroft said there was a request for Raissi's extradition, but said he did not believe Raissi would be eligible for the death penalty under the charges he now faced.

Raissi was arrested at his London home on September 21 on a request from the FBI and has since been linked by prosecutors to Hani Hanjour, the suspected pilot of American Airlines Flight 77, which crashed into the Pentagon.

The United States has repeatedly indicated it will eventually file a "conspiracy to murder" charge against Raissi.

Raissi has been indicted in Arizona for falsifying information on a Federal Aviation Administration form in June and for allegedly helping a fellow Algerian, Redouane Dahmani, falsely apply for political asylum in 2000.

Raissi has not been indicted for any terrorist acts and the official U.S. extradition warrant is based only on the current indictments.

Britain is required by national law, and as a signee of the European Human Rights Convention, not to extradite anyone to a country where a suspect could receive the death penalty. The United States has not signed the convention.

But analysts say the handing over of bin Laden in Afghanistan to the United States would make irrelevant any questions about extradition and the death penalty in the United States, because bin Laden would not be on British soil and would not be subject to British law.

The UK parliament would have to rewrite its death penalty law or make emergency provisions if it wanted to extradite a suspect to a country where the death penalty could be imposed.

At the news conference, Ashcroft said France had been cooperative in extraditing Ira Einhorn, wanted for the killing in the 1977 bludgeoning death of his girlfriend in Philadelphia, and James Kopp, a U.S. anti-abortion activist wanted for the killing of a doctor in western New York who performs aboritions.

Ashcroft has said the United States will not seek Kopp's execution if he is convicted of killing Dr. Barnett Slepian. Another promise of exemption from the death penalty has been given in Einhorn's case.

Ashcroft, who is travelling on to Spain ,Germany and Italy, stressed the need for co-ordinated response to terrorists who trained in one country, plotted in a second and operated in a third.

CNN's European Political Editor, Robin Oakley, says there have been stutters in Europe's responses to fighting terrorism.

"The House of Lords in Britain is mauling Blunkett's anti-terrorism bill and a reluctant Silvio Berlusconi, Italy's prime minister, had to be strong-armed by other European leaders into agreeing to a Europe-wide arrest warrant," he said.

But Ashcroft insisted that cooperation between the UK and the US was a model of how the battle against terrorism should be fought.

He was not in Europe, he insisted, to tell others how to direct their fight against ther terrorists. That was a judgment each mature, sovereign nation had to make for itself.



 
 
 
 


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