Lotfi Raissi

Lotfi Raissi outside the high court in 2008. Photograph: Stefan Rousseau/PA

The pilot falsely accused of training the hijackers responsible for the 9/11 terrorist attacks has won his almost decade-long miscarriage of justice battle.

Lotfi Raissi, an Algerian living in Britain who lost his career as an airline pilot, suffered wrongful imprisonment and damage to his health, will now be eligible for up to £2m compensation.

Raissi became the first person to be accused of participating in the 2001 attack in New York and Washington. He was held for five months in Belmarsh high security prison in London and told he would be charged with conspiracy and murder in the US where he could face the death penalty.

Today he described the last nine years as "hell" but said he was delighted with the decision by Jack Straw, the justice secretary. "I have suffered such a great injustice, I'm grateful for this verdict. They took almost 10 years of my life and now I'm starting to breathe again."

He added: "I've been exonerated, not just by a court, but by the British government. Now I can turn the page, but I can never forgive them for what they did."

Raissi's solicitor, Jules Carey, said: "The ministry of justice has formally notified me that the justice secretary has found that Mr Raissi is 'completely exonerated' of the allegations of terrorism. The allegations of terrorism were utterly ruinous to him both personally and professionally."

Carey said the decision to compensate Raissi on the grounds of "exoneration" rather than "serious default" by a public authority was "extremely unfortunate" as it meant that mistakes made by the CPS and the Metropolitan police in the case, identified by the court of appeal in 2008, would now not be investigated.

James Welch, legal director at human rights charity Liberty, said: "The shabby treatment of this innocent man is a chilling reminder of why we all need the protection of the courts."

Raissi's arrest, at his home in Colnbrook, Berkshire, 10 days after the 9/11 attacks, followed an extradition request from the FBI. In court, where he awaited extradition to the US on a holding charge, he was described by British lawyers representing the US as one of the lead instructors of the four hijackers.
A judge threw the case out in 2002 and said there was no evidence against him. Since then, Raissi has sought an apology. In 2008, in a judgment that exonerated him, three court of appeal judges condemned the Met and the CPS for abusing the court process, presenting false allegations and not disclosing evidence.

Today, a Ministry of Justice spokesman said: "After careful consideration of all the relevant material available to him, the justice secretary, Jack Straw, has notified Mr Raissi that he is eligible for compensation."

A British family has been banned from staying at a chain of luxury hotels after allegedly requesting not to be served by "people of colour" at a Florida resort.

The demand, allegedly lodged by the family on arrival, has emerged in a claim by a Haitian-born waiter against the Ritz-Carlton hotel in Naples, Florida. The family, named by the hotel as the Morgans, are said to have checked in on 29 February.

According to the writ, the hotel – at the direction of its managing director, Edward Staros – recorded on its computers the "preference" that the family not be served by "people of colour" or staff with "foreign accents". The note reportedly added: "This couple is very very prejudice".

The claimant, Wadner Tranchant, 40, a naturalised US citizen who has worked at the Ritz-Carlton for 15 years, said that on 12 March the hotel "instructed the serving staff regarding the stated prejudice of the Morgan family" when they reserved a table in the restaurant. Tranchant's attorney, Michael McDonnell, told the Guardian: "As a lawyer you are required to conduct an investigation before taking a case, and we have done that. There are a number of witnesses to support his story."

Tranchant is still employed at the Ritz-Carlton despite his lawsuit against the hotel chain, McDonnell said.

The lawsuit seeks more than $75,000 (£49,000) in compensation for Tranchant, who was "humiliated, embarrassed, frightened, intimidated, subject to undeserved shame and suffered severe emotional distress". No date has been set for a hearing. The hotel has 20 days from when the lawsuit was filed on Tuesday to submit a formal response.

The Ritz-Carlton's website promises "world class restaurants and impeccable service" at its Naples property, a 450-room waterfront hotel with panoramic views of the Gulf of Mexico, two heated swimming pools and two golf courses designed by the former world No 1 Greg Norman where rates start at $439.

Tranchant's claim states that staff in the restaurant were advised "through its computer notification system and word of mouth" of the family's "stated prejudice", and that as Tranchant began to serve them "he was prevented by his supervisors from doing so because they did not want to be waited on by a black person".

The lawsuit adds: "Other employees also encountered similar treatment on multiple occasions", with "such conduct so severe or pervasive that a reasonable person in [Tranchant's] position would find the work environment to be hostile or abusive".

The Ritz-Carlton group declined to say whether any staff had been disciplined, but confirmed the family had been contacted and "banned from staying at any Ritz-Carlton hotel". Vivian Deuschl, a company spokeswoman in Washington, said the hotel "does not tolerate or condone discrimination of any kind by its employees or visiting guests."

Bruce Seigel, the hotel's director of marketing, added: "The hotel has very strict policies in place to prohibit discrimination and harassment and we take very seriously any allegation of discrimination or harassment."
The case provoked a flurry of comments on US websites. "The hotel should be fined heavily … and the money given to a charity that helps fight racism," was one view.

"Those beastly boors from Britain should have been given the boot the moment they made their bigoted request," noted another blogger.

One New Yorker posted: "I know this may sound wrong, but I have to side with the hotel on this one. They're simply doing what they're supposed to and honor the old adage about the customer always being right."

London, England (CNN) -- Elections, the American commentator H.L. Mencken once insisted, are the process in which all the parties rush around the country insisting that the others are unfit to govern, and in the end they are all proved right.

Certainly the tone of the second TV debate between the leaders of the three main parties was a great deal sharper. When Gordon Brown joked, with the aid of his speaking notes, that hearing Messrs Clegg and Cameron in dispute reminded him of his two young sons squabbling at bath time, Nick Clegg retorted sharply that Brown's joke had probably been better delivered in rehearsal.

"Get Real, Nick" said Gordon Brown and he and David Cameron ganged up in trying to depict Clegg as irresponsible over his willingness to put the future of Britain's Trident nuclear weapons system into the defense review they all agree should be conducted.

Fortunately for Clegg their attack was rendered less harmful by the bunch of former military chiefs who wrote to the London Times making the same demand as Clegg and suggesting there might be better ways of spending the money to curb terrorism or equip our troops.

UK Election Blog

Clegg and Brown ganged up in trying to depict Cameron as a rigid ideologue who would prejudice Britain's interests in fighting crime and terrorism because of his eagerness to pick a fight with Europe and repatriate powers from Brussels.

Clegg and Cameron were together in insisting that the government had sent troops to Afghanistan improperly equipped.

But for all the point scoring the debate was a huge success. All three have raised their game and I doubt whether so many British voters have ever heard so much policy detail at one sitting. And with only one more to go Clegg has demonstrated that he is not a one-debate wonder but likely to last the course.

Brown was the biggest improver in round two and his opening statement made his purpose clear. If it is all about style and PR, he said, then forget it. But remember that, whatever you think of me, I can deliver. He closed by insisting "the buck stops here" and be declaring that Cameron was a risk to economic recovery, Clegg a risk to the nation's security.

Brown, sensibly, is playing the experience card and playing it quite well. Like the others he knows that after the end of a parliament which had become a by-word for corruption, with all those stories about politicians' expenses fiddles, the public wants change. But as the leader of a party which has been in power since 1997 he knows he cannot convince as the agent of change. He is stuck with offering security and stability.

The key for Brown now is not to let the gap between his third place and the Lib Dem and Conservative poll ratings grow too far, because, such are the vagaries of the British voting system, that he could come third in terms of vote share and yet still have more Parliamentary seats than the other two parties.
Video: Social media react to second UK debate
Video: Analyzing the second UK debate
Video: UK voters react to second debate
Video: Should there be a coalition government?
RELATED TOPICS

* British Politics
* United Kingdom
* Nicholas Clegg
* Gordon Brown
* David Cameron

David Cameron's problem is that he had set out to be the agent of change, hence the greening and modernizing of the Conservative Party. It was the trick pulled off by Tony Blair before he led Labour to victory in 1997: "I have reformed and refashioned my party, now I am ready to do the same for the country."

But despite leading in the opinion polls since the end of 2007, Cameron has somehow failed to seal the deal with the public. Even a fair number of Conservative don't feel quite comfortable with him and his financial chief George Osborne.

Can Brown make a political comeback?

Cameron too was sharper in Round Two, more confident and persuasive. One bookmaker rather curiously paid out on him as the "winner" of the debate. Tricky to be sure of that when there is no finishing line. But Cameron has also begun to sound more like Margaret Thatcher than he has ever done -- the Euro-skepticism, the insistence on careful spending, the use of Conservative code words like "school discipline."

It all sounded like an attempt to reassure the core Conservative vote. But the more he does that the greater his risk with those crucial floating voters.

The game has changed for Cameron. Clegg's seizing of his opportunity in the first TV debate has established him as the agent of change. For Cameron to secure a working majority he now has just a fortnight to knock out or at least to marginalize Clegg.

The Conservative leader's allies in the media are certainly doing their best to help him. Some of the attacks on Clegg in the press have been fair game -- politics in Britain is a robust sport -- others have varied between the laughable and the vile.

Can Cameron become the UK's next leader?

So over-the-top have some of the attacks on Clegg been that Twitterers started a fanciful collection of the other sins that could be laid at the Lib Dem leader's door. He had been seen poking a stick into Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull volcano, his was the face seen on the grassy knoll as the JFK entourage swept by and it was Clegg who sabotaged the pitch to ensure that David Beckham snapped his Achilles tendon in the World Cup run-up.

Labour has been muddled in its attitude to a hung parliament, in which no party can claim a ruling majority and coalitions must be formed.

Home Secretary Alan Johnson has beamed his acceptance of the idea, Gordon Brown's long-time ally Ed Balls has insisted that it is not the British way of doing things. The Conservatives, however, have been adamant that a hung parliament represents a massive danger.
If no party has a governing majority, says Cameron, and his is the only party which retains the hope of one, then we risk a falling pound, higher interest rates and a dip in Britain's credit rating. Former finance minister Ken Clarke warns that in a hung parliament the IMF might have to bail Britain out.

Good tactics? Or could that too be a tactical error? Will the public really take kindly to the Conservatives saying "Vote for us or take the consequences?" His worry must be that that could prove just another reason for young voters at least saying:"We'll give that guy Clegg a try?"