Court ruling on Haneef's visa on Friday

MELBOURNE: An Australian court will decide on Friday a petition challenging its ruling to overturn the cancellation of work visa of Indian doctor Mohammad Haneef, a former terror suspect.
    
In August, a Federal Court Judge had declared illegal the then Immigration Minister Kevin Andrews' decision to cancel the 27-year-old medico's 457 work visa on character grounds because of his association with UK terror suspects Sabeel and Kafeel Ahmed.
     
However, lawyers for the Immigration Minister appealed the decision before the full bench of the Federal Court in Brisbane in November and the three-member panel reserved its decision.
     
A Federal court spokesman said Chief Justice Michael Black would hand down his decision at 2.30pm local time at the Commonwealth Law Courts Building on Friday.
      
Haneef was arrested at the Brisbane International Airport in July, shortly after the failed UK terror plot and was held in custody for 12 days before being charged with "recklessly" providing support to terrorists.
     
Haneef spent four weeks in detention as Andrews cancelled his work visa following a Brisbane magistrate's decision to free him on bail.
     
The charges were dropped later as Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions announced there was no reasonable prospect of a conviction and Haneef returned to Bangalore.
     
A series of leaks and accusations of a bungled probe caused a major embarrassment to the previous John Howard government and led to a diplomatic dust-up.