Court backs ruling against Jackal

THE European Court of Human Rights yesterday ruled that eight years of solitary confinement for Carlos the Jackal did not violate the jailed terrorist’s rights or amount to inhumane treatment.

The court’s Grand Chamber upheld a January 2005 ruling of a lower chamber that said the lengthy solitary confinement did not breach the European Convention on Human Rights.

But the court awarded the Venezuelan, whose real name is Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, €10,000 in damages because he was not allowed to contest his long solitary confinement in a French administrative court.

Ramirez was held in solitary confinement from his detention in 1994 until 2002 on grounds of his being dangerous, the need to maintain order in the prison and the risk of his escaping.