It seems rather odd. AFAIK the original judgment was given on the 17th Jan and any appeal had to be made within 3 months. Well, there is only one 17th in any month so the time for appeal therefore expired on the 16th April (at midnight). This is the UK government position and I think it right. However, as I understand it the ECHR procedure does not include automatic rejection of an appeal if it is out of time but goes to a 5-judge panel to determine admissibility and one of the things they consider in deciding admissibility is whether the appeal was made in due time.

Presumably Qatada's lawyers (and so far court officials) say that the first day for appeal was the 18th so time expired on the 17th but that cannot be right since Qatada could have appealed on the very day of the January judgment, that being the 17th and not the 18th.