Supporters of an Afgan family deported from Britain to Germany say they fear their case may suffer because the mother is ill.

The appeal hearing for the Ahmadi family is due to resume on Wednesday with the couple giving evidence via a video link from the German city of Nuremberg.

They are challenging Home Secretary David Blunkett's decision to deport them after they were removed by police from a mosque in Lye, Stourbridge.

But Mrs Feriba Ahmadi was taken into a psychiatric unit for treatment at the end of October and their supporters say she may be unable to continue giving evidence.

'Bad way'

Psychiatrist Stuart Turner had previously told immigration appeals adjudicator Judith Davidson that he had "serious concerns" about Mr Ahmadi's ability to give accurate evidence following his wife's collapse.

In Lye they had a home, friends and family and lived like human beings

Elaine Heffernan, CDAS

The hearing is due to resume again on Wednesday but the Committee to Defend Asylum Seekers (CDAS) says it is concerned it may have to be postponed again.

CDAS's Elaine Heffernan, who has visited the family at the German camp in Landsberg, said: "Feriba is in a very bad way.

"I don't know what is going to happen with the hearing because Feriba is too ill to give evidence and she is unable to look after the children on her own.

"She has fits a lot of the time now and Farid is also in a bad way."

'No support'

She added: "The camp they are living in is surrounded by barbed wire and has uniformed guards on the gate.

"They are free to come and go but it is in the middle of the German countryside and they have no money.

"In Lye they had a home, friends and family and lived like human beings. In Germany they don't have that support."

The Ahmadi's fled Afghanistan in 2000 with daughter Hadia, now six, and son Seear, now four.

They say they were persecuted and tortured because Mr Ahmadi's father was a brigadier in the army under an earlier regime.