Zaoui bail law to be reviewed

The Government will review the law which the Supreme Court has ruled entitles Ahmed Zaoui to apply for bail, but only after the court's decision on whether to grant bail to the Algerian is determined.

New Zealand First yesterday called on the Government to change the law immediately, to prevent the possibility of Mr Zaoui being released from prison.

NZ First spokesman Dail Jones said Mr Zaoui was a threat to national security and Parliament had clearly intended to prevent people being held under a security risk certificate from being released from custody.

Mr Jones said he was not criticising the Supreme Court's ruling, but said the decision meant that the section of the Immigration Act which the Government had argued prevented a bail application was not clearly written.

The Government had moved to legislate Crown ownership over the foreshore and seabed in the wake of a court finding that it had not asserted its ownership as intended, he said, and it should now do the same in this case and change the Immigration Act.

A spokesman for Immigration Minister Paul Swain said the Government would review the Act, as earlier signalled.

But it would not do so before the court ruled on the bail application and would accept whatever decision was delivered by the court in regard to Mr Zaoui.

The Supreme Court will hear Mr Zaoui's application in two weeks.

His lawyers are seeking bail, or for him to be moved from jail to the Mangere Refugee Resettlement Centre.

Mr Zaoui has been detained in jail for the past two years without charge and is currently appealing the security risk certificate.