PATRICK Kelly (48) is serving a 25 year sentence for conspiracy to cause an explosion and the attempted murder of a police officer. The Ballybrittas, Co Laois, man was caught driving a lorry packed with 3.2 tons of home made explosives into central London on the eve of the Lord Mayor's show in November 1992.
Last month, Kelly's partner and mother of his child, Ms Angela Rice, visited Maghaberry prison and said he was now in severe pain, had lost a lot of weight and was not sleeping or eating. She said his skin cancer was spreading. Five years ago he had two operations on his back in Portlaoise Hospital to treat cancerous growths.
"He is unable to have visitors. I could not even bring our daughter Sarah Louise to see him. He just isn't able for her," she added. He had only seen his three year old daughter a few times.
Ms Rice has been campaigning intensively to have Kelly repatriated on compassionate grounds, lobbying politicians of all parties in both countries and organising petitions.
Passing sentence in October 1993, Mr Justice Leonard said he should "pass a sentence which will protect the public from serious harm from you. He said the lorry would have killed or seriously hurt anyone in the area.
Last year doctors said Kelly's condition was life threatening. He was then held in a secure unit in Whitemoor prison, confined to his cell for 23 hours a day. He was transferred to Maghaberry Prison near Lisburn, Co Antrim, because of his "exceptional circumstances".
Last month a petition calling for his transfer and signed by 140 TDs and 30 Senators was presented to the British ambassador to Ireland and forwarded it to the Home Secretary, Mr Michael Howard. Legislation allowing for the transfer of overseas prisoners has been in place since last November.
The chairman of the Dail Committee on Legislation and Security, Mr Charles Flanagan, and the Fianna Fail spokesman on prisoners, Mr Eamon O Cuiv, have backed calls for his transfer.
The SDLP MP for West Belfast, Dr Joe Hendron, last night welcomed the news of Kelly's impending transfer. He said that following a meeting with the British prisons minister last week, he had known that a decision was imminent, "and I was hopeful it would be positive".
Before news of the transfer the Sinn Fein president, Mr Gerry Adams, had released a statement yesterday describing the British refusal to act as "a vindictive act of inhumanity".
The DUP's Justice and Prisons spokesman, Mr Ian Paisley Jnr, called the decision a mistake, saying it demonstrated that the British government would make any effort to get Sinn Fein into a "phoney peace process".