Terrorist who plotted to bomb London Stock Exchange was allowed to remain in Britain on human rights grounds
A terrorist jailed over a plot to bomb the London Stock Exchange was allowed to remain in Britain despite being denied asylum, it has emerged.
Shah Rahman, a Bangladeshi national and one of four al-Qaeda-inspired extremists convicted in 2012, was refused refugee status but later granted the right to stay in the UK on human rights grounds.
Details of the decision have been revealed in a newly published immigration judgment concerning his wife, Parveen Purbhoo, who has now been permanently excluded from Britain after Isis-related material was discovered on her phone.
The ruling shows Rahman applied for asylum in 2017, the same year he was first released on licence.
His claim was rejected under Article 51 of the Refugee Convention, which bars individuals involved in terrorism or serious crimes from being granted refugee status.
However, despite this, he was allowed to remain. The judgment states: ‘He was granted restricted leave to remain in the United Kingdom on the basis that he could not be removed to Bangladesh without breach of his rights under Article 3 of the Human Rights Convention.’
Article 3 of the Human Rights Convention provides an absolute right of protection from torture, or inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.
Shah Rahman, who plotted to bomb the London Stock Exchange, can be re-released from prison, the Parole Board has said
Rahman, who had been jailed for threatening to blow up the stock exchange, was released on licence in June 2019.
That same month, he married Purbhoo, a Mauritian citizen, in an Islamic ceremony at East London Mosque while she was visiting the UK.
Purbhoo’s identity and her relationship with Rahman can now be reported after legal restrictions were lifted.
She later applied for entry clearance to Britain. Her first application was refused, but a second attempt succeeded. In submissions to the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (Siac), she said she returned to the UK in February 2020 before leaving again a month later due to the pandemic.
In August 2021, she attempted to re-enter the UK to formalise the marriage in a civil ceremony.
As a Mauritian national, she did not require a visa and travelled using an electronic travel authorisation.
But on arrival at Heathrow, immigration officers searched her phone and found Isis-related material, including videos of soldiers and jihadist propaganda.
A police report presented to the court found: ‘She appeared very blasé about having them on her mobile. She could not remember where or how they got there. She admitted that she wanted to learn more about it and what it was and about the atrocities.’
Despite this, she was allowed into the country and went on to live with Rahman.
He was arrested in February 2022 and recalled to prison after breaching the terms of his licence. He was convicted of failing to notify authorities about a mobile phone, email address and bank account.
The judgment said: ‘Mr Rahman accepted before the parole board that he would use the illicit mobile phone to contact the applicant. In his witness statement in these proceedings, he accepts that he used the phone to have private video calls with her.’
A forensic psychology report also found that Purbhoo had been ‘complicit in the breaches for which Mr Rahman was convicted’.
Her case was reviewed in 2023 and she was permanently excluded from the UK by Suella Braverman. In a ruling published on Monday, judges upheld that decision and rejected her appeal.
Mrs Justice Farbey, Mark Ockelton and Roger Golland found: ‘The applicant was complicit in Mr Rahman’s unlawful breach of notification requirements; and she has not provided either the police or SIAC with an explanation of how Islamist material came to be on her phone.
‘Her willingness to place her own interests over and above legal or administrative processes is troubling and risky.’
The commission concluded that she had been ‘reasonably assessed as a national security risk’ and that her exclusion from the UK was proportionate.
