Until now. London Jihad Update: “Andrews dishes dirt on Haneef,” by Matthew Franklin and Bruce Loudon in The Australian (thanks to PRCS):
FREED terror suspect Mohamed Haneef was warned by his brother last month to use the birth of his daughter in India as a pretext to flee Australian authorities investigating bombing attacks in London and Glasgow, according to chatroom messages intercepted by investigators.
After Dr Haneef was told “nothing has been found out about you”, he moved quickly, booking a one-way ticket to India and organising leave from his job at the Gold Coast Hospital.
Immigration Minister Kevin Andrews released the chatroom messages last night in an attempt to defuse criticism over his decision to strip the 27-year-old Dr Haneef of his work visa, despite a charge of recklessly assisting terrorists being withdrawn on Friday in the Federal Magistrates Court.
[…]
The exchange was revealed against a background of strident denials of any knowledge of terrorism by Dr Haneef, and his claim that he had tried repeatedly to contact Scotland Yard after hearing of the British bombing attempts. He had hoped to explain that he had left a mobile phone SIM card with a relative implicated in the attacks.
But the British authorities failed to return his calls.
In Bangalore, Dr Haneef’s lawyer, Peter Russo, said the information revealed by Mr Andrews had been dealt with in a police interview. “It is more smoke and mirrors from the minister,” Mr Russo told Southern Cross Broadcasting. “(Mr Andrews) has led the Australian public to believe that this is the secret information. It is hardly secret information if it was put to my client in the second record of interview … the Director of Public Prosecutions would have had access to that when they were making their judgment call (to drop the case).”
Mr Andrews said the intercepts showed the brother of Dr Haneef saying, “Nothing has been found out about you”, and asking him when he could leave Australia. “Today,” Dr Haneef had replied.
Mr Andrews said the brother had then asked whether Dr Haneef had permission to take leave and that Dr Haneef had told his employer that his daughter, Haniya, had been born in India by emergency caesarian.
The brother had then advised: “Tell them that you have to as you have a daughter born, do not tell them anything else.”
Mr Andrews said the brother also ordered Dr Haneef not to give his contact details to anyone and added that “Auntie told him that brother Kafeel used it in some sort of protest over there”, in a reference to accused British bombing suspect Kafeel Ahmed.
Mr Andrews said Australian Federal Police had cited the exchange as possible evidence of Dr Haneef’s “awareness of the conspiracy to plan and prepare the acts of terrorism in London and Glasgow”.
“The AFP consider Dr Haneef’s attempted urgent departure from Australia on a one-way ticket for a purpose which appears to be a false pretext to be highly suspicious,” Mr Andrews said.
[…]
Earlier, Dr Haneef demanded the Australian Government apologise “to my peace-loving country and citizens”. “Islam means love and peace,” he said. “I do not want anybody to be victimised in the name of terrorism.”