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Radical cleric can be sent to U.S.

  • Story Highlights
  • UK court: Radical Muslim cleric Abu Hamza al-Masri can be extradited to U.S.
  • Al-Masri's legal advisers: We are still exploring avenues of appeal
  • Followers include "shoe bomber" and only person to be charged for 9/11
  • Praised 9/11 attacks, called 2003 shuttle disaster punishment from Allah
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LONDON, England (CNN) -- A British court ruled Thursday that radical Muslim cleric Abu Hamza al-Masri can be extradited to the United States, a member of al-Masri's defense team confirmed to CNN, though any final decision on extradition is still several months away.

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Abu Hamza al-Masri's followers include the "shoe bomber" and the only person charged in the 9/11 attacks.

Al-Masri's legal advisers said they were still exploring avenues of appeal, a process which could take months. Under British law, al-Masri must be allowed to exhaust his appeals before any extradition proceedings continue.

The British home secretary also has until the end of the cleric's current seven-year jail term to approve the extradition, though the Home Office said Secretary Jacqui Smith was expected to make a decision "shortly."

Al-Masri, who lost both hands and one eye working in Afghanistan, is the highest-profile radical Islamic figure in Britain. Video Watch a profile of the militant cleric »

He formerly preached at the Finsbury Park Mosque in London. His followers included the so-called "shoe bomber" Richard Reid -- who was convicted of trying to light a bomb in his shoes on a trans-Atlantic flight -- and Zacarias Moussaoui, the only person to be charged in the United States in connection with the September 11, 2001, terror attacks.

The Egyptian-born cleric began serving a seven-year prison sentence last year after being convicted in a British court of soliciting murder and inciting racial hatred.

But he is also facing 11 terrorism-related charges in the United States, which has promised to press for his extradition when British law allows.

The U.S. charges include conspiracy in connection with a 1998 kidnapping in Yemen and conspiring with others to establish an Islamic jihad, or holy war, training camp in rural Oregon in 1999.

If his appeals are denied, al-Masri could have his jail sentence interrupted to be extradited and stand trial in the United States, according to the Home Office. If he is given a prison sentence following a U.S. trial, he would return to England to complete the rest of his sentence there before flying back to be imprisoned in the United States.

A British judge last year sentenced al-Masri to seven years for soliciting murder and inciting racial hatred. The court convicted the cleric of possessing items including a 10-volume "encyclopedia" of Afghani jihad, which the prosecutor described as "a manual for terrorism;" the texts discussed how to make explosives, explained assassination methods, and detailed the best means of attack.

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The cleric was also convicted of possessing video and audio recordings which prosecutors said he intended to distribute to stir up racial hatred.

Both non-Muslims and Muslims have condemned al-Masri's preaching, which include praising the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States, calling al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden a hero, and describing the 2003 Columbia shuttle disaster as punishment from Allah because the astronauts were Christian, Hindu and Jewish. E-mail to a friend E-mail to a friend

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