Home Secretary Jack Straw is to face a legal challenge as early as next week which could order him to petition for the release of Guatanamo detainee Omar Deghayes.

It is a major step forward in the campaign by The Argus calling for justice for Mr Deghayes, 36, of Saltdean, who has been held under no charge at the facility for almost four years.

Mr Deghayes, and two other British residents detained at the US military base, Guantanamo Bay, were yesterday granted permission by a High Court judge to seek a court order requiring Jack Straw to petition for their release.

The case brought by Mr Deghayes, Bisher al-Rawi and Jamil el-Banna and members of their families living in the UK, could be heard within days - a significant breakthrough in the campaign to either bring Mr Deghayes to trial or release him.

The judge, Mr Justice Collins, at the High Court in London, said allegations of torture being practised at the facility in Cuba meant the detainees, and their families living in the UK, had an arguable case that the British Government was under an obligation to act on their behalf.

Mr Justice Collins stressed his decision was "no guarantee" that the three men would win their cases - there were formidable arguments against it.

The judge's decision came after a day-long hearing during which he commented that America's idea of what constituted torture "is not the same as ours and doesn't coincide with that of most civilised countries".

His remarks coincided with a UN report which urged that the Guantanamo facility should be shut down and called on the US Government to refrain from any practice "amounting to torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment".

The case against Mr Straw is expected to be heard in full in mid-March.

Mr Justice Collins said he would have to approach this case on the basis there was evidence torture was being practised at the base.

Human rights lawyer Gareth Peirce, who is leading the case against Mr Straw, is to argue the Government has legal obligations to help the three British detainees which it is failing to uphold.

She is asking the High Court to order a judicial review to examine those obligations and determine if the Government has a legal duty to act to get them out.

Rabinder Singh, of the London-based firm, Birnberg Peirce & Partners, said the case arose out of what had been described by a Law Lord as the "utter lawlessness at Guantanamo Bay", where people are being detained indefinitely without trial.

The question was how the courts of this country should respond to that lawlessness, specifically in the case of the three detainees in question, who are all long-time residents of the UK, but not British citizens.