An asylum seeker who married a former head girl of a Brighton school is fighting to stay in the city.

Ruzhdi Nela, 19, wants to stay with his wife, Amy Granger, so the baby they are expecting next year can be brought up in a stable family home.

Ruzhdi arrived in Dover from Albania three years ago in the back of a container lorry. He was given six months' permission to stay while his case was looked at.

The permission was then renewed on a six-monthly basis.

But now Ruzhdi has been told by the Home Office he must return to Albania, where his uncle was hanged for supporting the democracy movement against communism and his father is in hiding or possibly dead.

Immigration officials have rejected his plea to stay in the country, stating his marriage was not "genuine and subsisting".

Amy, 25, a care support worker for disabled adults, said: "If it means I have to sew my flesh to his to ensure he stays here to bring up our son or daughter, then I will do that.

"This is not a case of an illegal immigrant arriving in this country, asking for social security, getting council accommodation and then paying an English girl to go through a marriage ceremony.

"He has never taken a penny from social security. He works very hard and we are genuinely in love."

Since arriving in England, Ruzhdi has been constantly in work, last year earning about £16,000 as a builder.

In a last bid to stay together in Britain, the couple, who live in Tennis Road, Hove, are seeking a hearing by the Immigration Appeals Tribunal. If it fails, Ruzhdi will be deported.

The couple are fully supported by Amy's father, Colin Granger, who lives in Saltdean. He said: "I have never seen Amy so happy. They are genuinely in love. If it means barricading Ruzhdi in a room in my house to stop the police deporting him, I will do that."

Amy, a former head girl of Varndean School, already had her own flat in Tennis Road when she met Ruzhdi at a friend's barbecue.

They married at Brighton register office last July.

She said: "We just clicked. We would go for long walks and just talk. Ruzhdi is regarded as a good worker wherever he works and is popular with my friends and family."

Immigration officials have said Amy "could reasonably be expected to live in Albania" without their family life being disrupted.

On the question of political asylum, the department ruled Ruzhdi should have mentioned his fears of persecution in Albania in his first interview.

Ruzhdi has press cuttings of his family's involvement in the democracy movement, which was active while Communists ruled in the late Eighties. He said his family was regarded as a dangerous opposition in Albania.

His uncle, Havzi, was publicly hanged after being captured and Ruzhdi believes his father, Shemshi, is either dead or in hiding. His four brothers have fled to live in Italy.

Ruzhdi left Albania by boat to Italy and then by lorry to Paris. He was smuggled into Britain in a container lorry which he and other asylum seekers were crammed into for 16 hours.

He said: "The lorry was checked but they only checked the bottom and not the top where I and others were hiding."

Ruzhdi arrived here with no money and a list of telephone numbers but was eventually caught by the police and sent to a hotel in Newhaven.

He said: "Throughout the whole of the time I have been here, the authorities have known where I was and I have made no attempt to run away or disappear."

A spokeswoman for the Home Office said: "The Appeals Tribunal has the final say. If the appeal is rejected, we sometimes hold people in detention centres before they are deported.

"If there are a lot of people who have to be sent back to one particular country, we sometimes charter a plane."