Hook-handed terrorist suspect struggling in jail: Lawyers

NEW YORK (AFP) - Prison officials are hampering the one-eyed, handless British Islamist preacher extradited to the United States on terrorism charges from participating in his defence ahead of trial, lawyers said on Monday.

Mustafa Kamel Mustafa, better known in Britain as Abu Hamza Al-Masri, is already having day-to-day trouble in the high security wing of the Manhattan detention centre where he is being held because of his reliance on crude metal hooks instead of proper prosthetic hands, his defence team said.

But even stricter rules imposed in the last two weeks are also preventing court-appointed attorneys and the Egyptian-born leader of a mosque in north London from going through the mountains of evidence, lawyer Joshua Dratel told a Manhattan federal court.

"Mr Mustafa cannot participate in the process. He does not have a laptop.