250 foreign criminals escaped deportation on human rights ground in UK last year

London, July 22 (ANI): The British Home Office allowed 250 foreign criminals, who should have been deported at the end of their sentence, to stay on in the country on human rights grounds in 2011, without their claims being challenged in court.

According to The Telegraph, in each case, the Home Office accepted their argument that deporting them would be a breach of their human rights.

The number has increased five-fold in four years, creating doubts about British Home Secretary Theresa May 's commitment to deport foreign criminals.

The figures, disclosed under the Freedom of Information Act, show that there were 56 such cases in 2008, rising to 80 in 2009, 217 in 2010 and 250 in 2011.

The Home Office refused to name any of the 250 criminals, even though all have been convicted in open court of serious crimes.

It also refused to disclose numbers of many categories of criminal. A spokesman said this was "in order to protect individual identities".

The existence of the 250 criminals emerged after May introduced tougher rules for courts on the use of the "right to family life" to stay in Britain in response to The Sunday Telegraph's End The Human Rights Farce campaign.

In addition to the 250 criminals allowed to stay last year, other figures have previously disclosed there were a further 409 who won their cases in the courts on appeal. (ANI)