THE protracted process of extraditing Osama bin Laden’s London lieutenant to the United States is close to its conclusion, The Times has learnt.

Khalid al-Fawwaz, who has been charged in the United States over the 1998 East Africa embassy suicide bombings that killed 224 people, has been fighting extradition for seven years.

But according to a Home Office report, obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, Mr Fawwaz’s lawyers have been given a deadline by which they must submit last-ditch pleas against his surrender to the American authorities.

Charles Clarke, the Home Secretary, will then decide if Mr Fawwaz, a Saudi and personal friend of bin Laden, can be handed over. Mr Clarke faces pressure to make a decision in the long-running case, which is proving an embarrassment for the Government.

After the London bombings in July, Tony Blair promised to speed up extradition in terror cases by setting a maximum time limit. While Mr Fawwaz’s case has dragged on for seven years, a man wanted by France over terrorist bombings has been in jail here for a decade.

Mr Fawwaz, 41, ran al- Qaeda’s media office in London for four years, disseminating statements and fatwas. The claim of responsibility for the embassy bombs was allegedly transmitted to his associates by fax hours before the attacks.

Witnesses in the United States have testified that Mr Fawwaz, who is in prison in England, also ran an al-Qaeda training camp before he arrived in London from Kenya in 1994.

If convicted in America Mr Fawwaz, who has received more than £150,000 in legal aid, will be sentenced to life imprisonment without prospect of parole.

The Times asked why, despite a House of Lords ruling sanctioning extradition in December 2001, Mr Fawwaz remained in Britain.

The Home Office refused to divulge details of the legal discussions over Mr Fawwaz’s surrender, claiming that they could prejudice a trial in the US and damage Anglo-American relations. But officials said that Mr Fawwaz was given the opportunity to submit to the Home Secretary arguments against his surrender to the US.

His lawyers provided “voluminous representations” covering a range of issues that “ran to 87 pages and were followed up by 681 pages of supporting documentation”. Home Office lawyers raised several questions with the US Government, which took until last year to reply with a 33-page document.

Mr Fawwaz’s lawyers delivered a new batch of paperwork a year ago requiring a further response from the US, which did not arrive until this year.

Irving Jones, of the Home Office extradition unit, wrote: “We should perhaps stress here that the purpose was not to engage in endless dialogue but rather to satisfy the interests of fairness that the courts expect to be met in the decisionmaking process.”

In his response to The Times, the official could barely disguise his frustration that the process had become so protracted. Mr Jones wrote: “We asked that any final representations be received by not later than May 14 in order that this important case might be considered in the round and brought to a conclusion. On three occasions since then, however, Mr Fawwaz’s solicitors have asked for more time to complete their representations . . . The overall process has taken longer than was ever expected.”

Before his arrest Mr Fawwaz lived in a house in Dollis Hill, northwest London, and ran an al-Qaeda front organisation called the Advice and Reformation Committee.

According to the US indictment he arranged the purchase of a satellite phone for bin Laden in October 1997 and spoke to him and other senior al-Qaeda figures regularly.

Mr Fawwaz also had an office in West Kilburn which he shared with Adel Abdel Bary and another man, who can be named only as X, who are alleged members of the banned Egyptian Islamic Jihad group.

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