A terror suspect has been banned from taking AS levels in chemistry and human biology by the Home Office, which claims that the information learnt could help him to plan attacks.

The man, who is of Iraqi origin and in his thirties, has begun a High Court challenge to the ban, which the Government has imposed as he is the subject of an official control order.

Most of his personal details have been withheld for legal reasons and he has been referred to in court as AE. He is known to be unemployed and to have studied medicine in Iraq. Despite this, the Home Office has barred him from seeking academic qualifications normally taken by teenagers.

Mohammed Ayub, AE’s laywer, said that the Government feared that his client might use information from the AS-level courses for terrorist ends.

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The courses, however, teach little detail that would be of help to a terrorist planning a biological attack or making explosives. Most potentially sensitive details that are included, such as distillation techniques, are available on the internet.

Mr Ayub, of Chambers Solicitors, Bradford, also argued that AE’s medical knowledge is already well in excess of anything sensitive in the AS-level syllabus, and that his client’s only intention is to return to university.

The Home Office said that it could not comment on the case while the court challenge was continuing. The case has been adjourned until the new year, and a ruling is expected in the spring. Details of the case, thought to be the first of its kind, are reported to-day in the journal Nature.

Control orders were introduced under the 2005 Prevention of Terrorism Act. They are used when a terror suspect cannot be prosecuted in court because the evidence against them has either been obtained through bugging – and is therefore inadmissable in court – or would endanger informers or reveal sensitive intelligence. They allow the Home Office to impose curfews and travel bans, and to restrict certain activity such as internet access, mobile phone use and education.

AE is one of 14 people subject to a control order.

Scientists said that the chemistry and human biology AS levels did not teach much that would be of value to a terrorist. Colin Osborne, head of education at the Royal Society of Chemistry, said: “There’s very little in the chemistry course that would help a terrorist act.”

Neil Roscoe, head of education and training at the Institute of Biology, said that the human biology course does teach basic theories of disease transmission, but that it includes no details that would help someone to spread pathogens deliberately. It does, however, contain a module on neuro-toxins that describes their structure in some detail.

“If the Government wants to be cautious, there are aspects that could be considered as aiding the cause,” Dr Roscoe said.

Peter Atkins, Emeritus Professor of Physical Chemistry at the University of Oxford, said that any techniques taught by the courses could be learnt readily elsewhere: “Anybody with an interest in cooking could do them.”

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