The recipe for success, both for John Howard as well as other so-called Coalition of the Willing members, is falling flat in 2007. Accusing anyone who is Arabic used to be very well received by the media and the general population but after so many false charges and failures, the public around the world has become wiser. John Howard, prepare to spend more time with Tony Blair very soon.
Australian authorities dropped terrorism charges against a Sydney medical student on Monday, with a judge condemning police and intelligence agents for "grossly improper" behavior in the case.
Izhar Ul-Haque, 24, had been charged with receiving weapons training in 2003 from the Pakistan-based group Lashkar-e-Taiba, which is listed as a terrorist group in Australia. The case was dropped after police interviews with him were ruled inadmissible in court.
New South Wales Supreme Court judge Michael Adams said intelligence officers from the secretive Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) had kidnapped and falsely imprisoned Ul-Haque during their investigations.
"It was a gross interference by the agents of the state with the accused's legal rights as a citizen, rights which he still has whether he be suspected of criminal conduct or not, and whether he is Muslim or not," Adams said.
The development is a further blow to Australia's tough stand on national security after prosecutors in July dropped charges against an Indian doctor, saying they made a mistake by publicly charging him with supporting terrorism.
The case is also a blow to conservative Prime Minister John Howard, who won elections in late 2001 and 2004 on the back of his tough stand on national security. But his government is struggling in the polls ahead of elections on November 24.
