Bomb suspect was fake asylum seeker

Fraser Nelson:

THE ease with which the eldest member of the 21 July terror cell bluffed his way into Britain was exposed yesterday, as Italian police said he secured a UK passport simply by posing as a Somali asylum seeker.

Hamdi Adus Issac hoodwinked the Home Office by inventing a name - Hussein Osman - and claimed he was fleeing the Somali war when he was in fact an Ethiopian who had spent five years living apparently peacefully in Italy.

The Italian police explained how they captured Issac yesterday and last night started the extradition process by charging him formally. But his legal challenge may delay his arrival in Britain until the winter.

The head of the Italian anti-terrorist police, Carlo De Stefano, said that Issac - wanted in connection with an attempted attack on Shepherd's Bush Tube station - is an Ethiopian, speaking with a dialect from a region which borders Somalia. Like five of his brothers, he lived in Italy from 1991 to 1996, but decided to move to Britain.

"He falsely declared he was a Somali citizen to obtain the status of political refugee and economic assistance more easily," he said, clearly implying that welfare was an attraction.

Claiming Somali status has been a common tactic among bogus asylum seekers. No documentation is needed and without it the Home Office could grant citizenship based on nothing more than the say-so of the applicant. An official said that language checks have now been introduced to ascertain Somalian status, and that each asylum seeker is screened for personal circumstance.

The Home Office added that it takes precautions to stop such bogus asylum claims and recently outlawed the common practice of destroying identity documents en route to Britain. "Normally, people destroy their documents because we cannot send them back without them, should their asylum claim fail," said a spokesman.

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