A plane carrying the cleric left RAF Northolt in west London at around 2.45 a.m. (0145 GMT), media reported.

“This dangerous man has now been removed from our shores to face the courts in his own country,” said Home Secretary Theresa May, whose efforts to get Qatada out of the country had been frustrated by a series of legal rulings.

“I am glad that this government’s determination to see him on a plane has been vindicated and that we have at last achieved what previous governments, Parliament and the British public have long called for,” she added in a statement.

Once described by a Spanish judge as “Osama bin Laden’s right-hand man in Europe”, Abu Qatada has been in and out of jail since first being arrested in 2001. He was sent back to prison last March for breaching his bail conditions.

Jordan removed the last obstacle preventing Britain from sending Abu Qatada back home last month by approving an extradition treaty satisfying the concerns of British judges that evidence obtained through torture could be used against him.

May said Britain now needed to take a closer look at its human rights laws “to remove the many layers of appeals available to foreign nationals we want to deport”.

The saga had been embarrassing for Britain’s Conservative-led government, which wants to appear tough on security and immigration. DM

Photo: Radical Muslim cleric Abu Qatada is seen arriving back at his home after being released on bail, in London in this November 13, 2012 file photograph. Radical Muslim cleric Abu Qatada has been arrested in London for breaching his bail terms, days before the British government begins an appeal against a court decision blocking his deportation to Jordan. “The UK Border Agency arrested a 52-year-old man from north London for alleged breaches of his bail conditions imposed by the Special Immigration Appeals Commission,” a spokesman for the Home Office, or interior ministry, said on March 9, 2013. REUTERS/Neil Hall/Files