Jordanian legislative affairs minister Ayman Odeh has taken refuge in one of King Abdullah’s palaces tonight after hearing that Home Secretary Theresa May is ‘coming for talks’, diplomatic language that he’s in for a brutal tongue-lashing.
Home Office Minister James Brokenshire recently visited Jordan in a bid to secure an assurance that evidence obtained by torture would not be used against Abu Qatada, a condition laid down by the European Court of Human Rights for his deportation. Having returned to the UK empty-handed, however, the Minister was ‘sent for’ by the Home Secretary and later found hunched in a quiet corner of Westminster, sucking his thumb and gently rocking back-and-forth. ‘Torture? They don’t know the meaning of the word,’ he sobbed.
Ayman Odeh, who briefly met Miss May at a banquet in London last year, said he feared for his sanity. ‘She only said ‘good evening’ but I felt the icy fingers of fear run down my spine. Now she wants to mouth off full in my face. I’d rather have my fingernails pulled out with pliers.’ Bernard Hogan-Howe, head of the Metropolitan Police, has sent him a message of sympathy and Amnesty International is making urgent representations to the Human Rights Court in Strasbourg to block Miss May from re-entering the UK.