The re-arrest of Abu Qatada hit the headlines on Friday evening. He was conveniently taken to Belmarsh prison just a day and a half before a government bid to have him deported to Jordan where he faces a possible conviction based on torture evidence. 

After months of dignified silence while their father has been repeatedly publicly vilified in an unprecedented high-level political and media campaign, the children of Mohammed Othman (Abu Qatada) have now written an open letter on Twitter refuting some of the press misinformation about them, and detailing what they describe as escalating oppressive practices of the British government. They reveal too some of the extreme difficulties of their young lives in recent weeks and months, and the fact that threatening messages have become something they have learned to live with.

The witchunt against Abu Qatada simply reiterates the British Government's relationships with dictatorships - past and present

The witchunt against Abu Qatada simply reiterates the British Government's relationships with dictatorships - past and present

Like many other Algerians, Rachid Ramda fled the terrors of war and torture in his home country to seek asylum in the UK.

Rabah Kadre is 38 years old and from Algeria.

G is disabled as a result of suffering polio as a child.

BB is 43 years old Algerian national, a qualified electronic engineer and married to an Algerian woman with three young children.

Mustafa Melki (known as Detainee P) is in his thirties, and from Algeria.