Hijacker's case will be reviewed

An Iraqi man arrested at Stansted Airport after he helped to hijack an airliner has won the latest round of his 16-year fight to stay in the UK.

Mustafa Abdul Hussain, one of seven hijackers of a Sudan Airways Airbus which flew into Britain in August 1996, successfully challenged the Home Office after ministers refused to grant him indefinite leave to remain.

A judge at the High Court in London said the Home Secretary, Theresa May, should reconsider his case. Deputy High Court Judge James Dingemans QC said the Home Office decision to refuse Mr Hussain's request to stay in Britain was "flawed", because others involved in the hijacking had been allowed to do so.

Mr Hussain, who claims he was acting under duress when he carried out the hijacking, said he had been facing execution in Iraq at the time of the incident and that he "had no choice but [to] attempt to leave the country in the manner that we did by hijacking the Sudanese Airbus".

In 1997, Mr Hussain and others were tried and convicted for hijacking. A year later, their convictions were quashed by the Court of Appeal.