Court may give verdict today on citizenship of British woman who joined ISIS in Syria
While living there, Shamima Begum married an IS fighter and had three children, none of whom survived.
London:
A verdict is expected on Friday in the appeal case of a woman who lost her British citizenship as a teenager for marrying an Islamic State group fighter.
Shamima Begum, 24, took her case to the Court of Appeal in London in October last year against the revocation of her citizenship.
Her lawyer told the court that the Home Office had failed in its legal duties to consider Begum as a potential victim of trafficking.
Begum, whose family is of Bangladeshi origin, was 15 when she left her home in east London and moved to Syria with two school friends in 2015.
While there, she married an IS fighter and had three children, none of whom survived.
In February 2019, Begum said she became stateless when UK Home Secretary Sajid Javid revoked her British citizenship on national security grounds after she was found in a Syrian refugee camp.
A UK tribunal ruled in 2020 that she was not stateless because she was a “citizen of Bangladesh by descent” by virtue of her Bangladeshi mother when the decision was made.
Last year, Begum lost a challenge against the decision in the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC).
SIAC said that while there was “credible suspicion that Begum was recruited, transferred and then sheltered for the purpose of sexual exploitation”, this did not prevent Javid from obtaining his citizenship.
The decision meant Begum could not return to Britain from her current home, a refugee camp in northern Syria.
Home Office lawyers have argued that SIAC’s conclusion was correct.
Begum is one of hundreds of Europeans whose fate has challenged governments since the fall of the self-proclaimed caliphate to Islamic extremists in 2019.
Begum’s lawyer told the SIAC hearing that his client had been “influenced” by a “determined and effective” IS group “propaganda machine” with her friends.
It is estimated that around 900 people left Britain for Syria and Iraq to join the IS group. According to government figures, about 150 of them have been stripped of their citizenship.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)