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McAliskey committed for trial in Germany

Nicholas Evans, a stipendiary magistrate sitting at Bow Street court in central London, gave the go-ahead after a 20-minute hearing on Friday.

Ms McAliskey, 26, denies claims by German authorities that she was a member of an IRA unit which fired a mortar bomb at a British army barracks in Osnabruck in June 1996.

She was granted bail on condition she puts up a surety of £100,000, stays at the Maudsley Hospital in south London, where she is being treated for post traumatic stress disorder, and gives consent to future medical and psychiatric reports.

Since giving birth to a girl seven months ago while on bail, she has been staying at a mother and baby unit at Maudsley Hospital.

Her lawyers argue she faces serious damage to her mental health if extradited. They also say there is a lack of evidence against her.

The Home Secretary, Jack Straw, must now decide whether to allow the extradition to go ahead.

Ms McAliskey's mother, the former Mid-Ulster MP and Catholic civil rights campaigner Bernadette McAliskey, emerged from Friday's hearing and called on Mr Straw to intervene.

"I would expect him in all fairness and justice to do so. Should he lack the courage to do so we would then proceed with all the appeals left open to us."

The extradition hearing, which began in November 1996, had reached stalemate because of Ms McAliskey's reluctance to attend court.

Her lawyers and her mother said psychiatrists considered she was medically unfit to appear.

Three days before her baby was born in May, she was released on bail by a High Court judge.

Ms McAliskey is alleged to have been one of four members of an IRA "active service unit" that rented a cottage near the barracks before the mortar attack.

She was arrested at her home in Coalisland, County Tyrone, in November 1996.

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