High-ranking Afghan jihadist entered Britain illegally, dodged deportation, now living a Glasgow flat

A former Afghan terrorist leader has lived in Scotland while fighting to be granted asylum in the United Kingdom,

Dawalat Khan Nasir, 34, was commander of an outlawed group with close links to Osama bin Laden when he fled to the West and sought refugee status.

He arrived illegally in the UK three years ago and within weeks he was refused permission to stay, but a series of appeals has delayed his return to Afghanistan, and he obtained a flat in Glasgow.

Dawalat Khan Nasir claims he has well-founded fears of persecution by the Afghan authorities and members of his former group – he used its money to fund his flight.

But yesterday three judges in the Court of Session in Edinburgh dismissed his latest attempt to be afforded international protection under the Geneva Convention by remaining in the UK.

The judges said it was clear that his active involvement with the terrorist group Herzb-e-Islami Gulbuddin (HIG) had been contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations, and that meant he was excluded from the Geneva Convention

The ruling reinstates removal orders issued by the Home Office against him.

The court was told that Dawalat Khan Nasir came from the Nangarhar province and had been involved with HIG since his childhood. It was a mujahideen group founded by Gulbuddin Hekmatyar with close links to bin Laden and was a proscribed terrorist organisation in the UK.

He had taken over as commander when his father was killed during fighting with the international security force. However, he then used money belonging to HIG to flee Afghanistan. He travelled by plane and hidden in a lorry, and arrived in the UK in July 2006. He settled in Glasgow....

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A post-outage missive from our You-Can't-Make-This-Stuff-Up Department. It is indeed ironic that he is seeking "asylum" from the very conditions in Afghanistan he, as a jihadist, helped to create. And rewarding bad behavior encourages more of it. For the moment, the courts have not ruled in his favor, but it bears watching how long he can drag his feet in leaving the country.