THE Civil Liberties Committee of the European Parliament yesterday agreed to send a delegation to visit Ms Roisin McAliskey in Holloway prison in London after hearing pleas from Mr Niall Andrews (FF) and Ms Patricia McKenna (Green Party).
Ms McAliskey, who is seven months pregnant, is being held pending a decision of the British courts on whether she should be extradited to face questioning on the Osnabruck bombing.
Ms McKenna urged German MEPs to press their government on exactly where it stood on the issue of bail. The German Attorney General's office, she said, had claimed that Ms McAliskey's detention was entirely a matter for the British authorities, while a letter from the London embassy said that "in view of the seriousness of the charges . .. we must proceed with our request for detention pending extradition".
She deplored the repeated strip-searching of Ms McAliskey. Mr Andrews said that the conditions in which she was being kept amounted to "virtually torture".
The committee agreed to send a delegation to Holloway of three non-Irish and non-British members, headed by Dutch socialist Ms Hedy D'Ancona.
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