STRIPPED OF HER PASSPORT
Jihadi bride begging to come home with her new baby has UK citizenship dramatically ripped up by Home Secretary
ISLAMIC State bride Shamima Begum was stripped of her British citizenship yesterday by the Home Secretary.
In a letter to Begum’s mother, officials said Sajid Javid had taken the decision ‘in the light of the circumstances of your daughter’.
The 19-year-old has begged to be allowed to return from a refugee camp in northern Syria to her East London home with her four-day-old son.
But she has also given a series of interviews in which she has refused to denounce IS. The unrepentant teenager, who fled the UK in 2015, also sparked outrage by saying that Western air strikes against Syria were a ‘fair justification’ for the Manchester Arena suicide bombing.
In the letter to Begum’s mother Asma, officials said: ‘The notice of the Home Secretary’s decision has been served... today, and the order removing her British citizenship has subsequently been made.’
It is understood Mr Javid has taken the decision on the basis Begum has dual British and Bangladeshi citizenship – and therefore won’t be left stateless. However, it represents a dramatic gamble by the Home Secretary, with a lawyer for the family last night vowing to fight the move. Mr Javid had earlier promised to
use all available powers to prevent Begum m from returning to Britain. In other developments - yesterday:
■ A report revealed that a total of 156 cases s involving children in danger of being radicalised had come before the British family courts since 2013;
■ It emerged that a jihadi bride who returned to the UK from Isis territory had been told by a judge that she was too dangerous - to raise her toddler daughter;
■ Scotland Yard commissioner Cressida a Dick admitted that Isis brides could not be e prosecuted for simply going to Syria.
Mr Javid has the power to strip someone of f their British citizenship if they are suspected d of being involved in terrorist activity on the basis that that their presence in the UK is not conducive to the public good. However, , he can’t exercise this power if it will leave e someone stateless. Therefore it has to be e used on those with dual nationality.
Sources last night claimed that in Begum’s - case, she would not be left stateless s because she has dual British and Bangladeshi - citizenship.
But her family’s lawyer Tasnime Akunjee e said the teenager was born in London and d has only ever held a British passport.
The Home Office is understood to have e invoked a Bangladeshi law whereby offspring - of those born in Bangladesh are e automatically entitled to citizenship of that t country. But it is likely that Bangladesh h also has an option to refuse entry to those e it considers a security risk. The plight of f
‘Absolutely the right decision’
Begum’s new baby son remains unknown n and it is not clear whether the ban on entering - Britain also applies to the infant. Her r first two children both died of unknown illnesses - under Isis.
Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman Sir Ed Davey accused Mr Javid of ‘an abdication of responsibility’ by ‘palming g off’ Begum on to another country. ‘The UK K has more than enough terrorism laws to o prosecute Shamima Begum here,’ he said.
However, the Tory chairman of the Commons - Education Committee, Robert Halfon, who had spoken out against allowing Begum m to return, said in a tweet that Mr Javid had d made ‘absolutely the right decision’.
Immigration judges have the power to reverse decisions to take away citizenship. Two alleged extremists who were stripped of theirs by the Home Office won their appeals three months ago on the grounds that the government’s intervention was ‘unlawful’.
The furore erupted after a heavily pregnant Begum was found at a refugee camp in northern Syria by a journalist from The Times. Like other jihadi brides, she had fled the collapsing caliphate and begged to return to home so the NHS can care for her baby.
She declared no remorse over joining Isis and told how seeing a ‘severed head’ had not fazed her. After giving birth in the camp, she said she did not regret going to Syria because it ‘made her stronger’ – but said that people ‘should have sympathy’ towards her.
In one interview, she said the bombing at an Ariana Grade concert in 2017 which killed 22 people was ‘retaliation’ for ‘women and children’ being bombed in Syria. Survivors of the Manchester atrocity called her comments ‘outrageous’ and said she should not be allowed back into the country.
Begum said before she fled to Syria with fellow Bethnal Green Academy schoolgirls Kadiza Sultana and Amira Abase, she watched Isis videos of ‘beheadings’. She also watched propaganda videos before settling in Raqqa and marrying Yago Riedijk, a convicted terrorist who police believe was part of a cell plotting an atrocity in Europe.
The letter from the Home Office to Begum’s mother urged her to make her daughter aware of the decision, but added that she had a right to appeal. Lawyer Mr Akunjee said the family was ‘very disappointed’ with the decision and he was considering ‘all legal avenues to challenge’ it.
Earlier, the Met commissioner said if the teenager returned to the UK she could face questioning but that the current law might not be sufficient to see her prosecuted. She added that many of those who have returned have led ‘peaceful lives’.
There are currently plans to change the law to make travelling to certain terror hotspots a criminal offence, but this would not apply retrospectively to Begum. Around 425 suspected jihadi fighters are thought to have returned to the UK from Syria so far.