LONDON, Aug 12 Four British police officers are to be charged with assault over their arrest of a Muslim on suspicion of terrorism offences, prosecutors said on Thursday.

Babar Ahmad, 36, suffered heavy bruising to the head, neck, wrists and feet as he was being arrested in south London in December 2003.

Prosecutors initially said there was not enough evidence to charge anyone over the incident. But after Ahmad was paid 60,000 pounds in compensation by London's Metropolitan Police in a High Court action last year, his lawyers asked prosecutors to look again at the evidence.

“Our conclusion is that there is sufficient evidence and it is in the public interest to charge four of the officers involved in the arrest of Mr Ahmad with causing actual bodily harm to him,” Simon Clements of the Crown Prosecution Service said.“Police Constables Nigel Cowley, John Donohue, Roderick James-Bowen and Mark Jones will be summonsed to appear at City of Westminster magistrates' court on Sept 22.” The Metropolitan Police later said it would look at whether the men should be suspended from duties.

Ahmad is being kept in a British prison after the European Court of Human Rights last month blocked his extradition to the US to face terror charges, saying the case needed further examination.—AFP