Shamima Begum, British-born Isis bride appeals UK citizenship removal
- The British government took away Shamima Begum’s citizenship on national security grounds in 2019, shortly after she was found in a detention camp in Syria
- She left London in 2015, aged 15, and travelled with 2 friends to Syria, where she married an Isis fighter and gave birth to 3 children, all of whom died
A British-born woman who went to Syria as a girl to join Islamic State on Tuesday mounted her latest appeal against the removal of her British citizenship, arguing Britain failed to properly consider whether she was a victim of trafficking.
The British government took away Shamima Begum’s citizenship on national security grounds in 2019, shortly after she was found in a detention camp in Syria.
Begum first challenged the decision at the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC) – a specialist tribunal which hears appeals against decisions to remove citizenship on national security grounds – in 2019.
Her case has since travelled from SIAC to the UK’s Supreme Court and back, while Begum remains in the al-Roj detention camp in northeastern Syria.
In February, SIAC found there was a “credible suspicion” that Begum was trafficked to Syria for the purposes of sexual exploitation and there were arguably “state failures” in relation to her journey from London to Syria via Turkey in 2015.
However, SIAC ruled that a finding Begum may have been trafficked was not enough for her appeal to succeed, a decision which Begum’s lawyers sought to challenge on Tuesday.
