Movements of girls on a holy mission

Four years since friends left for Isil

Feb 17 2015

Kadiza Sultana, 16, and 15-year-olds Shamima Begum and Amira Abase leave their east London homes at 8am to travel to Istanbul from Gatwick Airport. Begum and Abase are reported missing

Feb 18

Kadiza Sultana is reported missing to the police

Feb 20

The Metropolitan Police appeal for information on the missing girls, who are feared to have gone on to Syria to join Isil. It emerges Sharmeena Begum, 15, their school friend, fled to Syria in December 2014

Feb 21

Police believe they are in Turkey. David Cameron says it is “deeply concerning”, adding: “[We] will do everything we can to help these girls.” The families of the three girls appeal to them to return

Feb 22

Abase Hussen, left, Amira Abase’s father, says she had told him she was going to a wedding. Met Police officers arrive in Turkey, but refuse to confirm if they are involved in the search for the teenagers

Feb 23

Mark Keary, the Bethnal Green Academy head, says there was no evidence the girls were radicalised there. Mr Cameron says airlines and internet firms must do more to stop British teenagers travelling to join Isil

Feb 24

Bülent Arınç, the Turkish deputy prime minister, criticises British authorities for taking three days to alert the country over the missing schoolgirls

March 10

The girls funded their trip by stealing jewellery from a family member, Mark Rowley, the Met Police assistant commissioner and the national police lead for counter-terrorism, tells MPS

April

Amira Abase confirms she has joined Isil by posting a picture of fast food on Twitter, captioned “dawla takeaway”. Shamima Begum is believed to be living in Raqqa with her husband

August 2016

Kadiza Sultana, 17, is reportedly killed in Raqqa – where the three girls were pictured, left – when a suspected Russian airstrike obliterates her house

January 2017

Shamima Begum moves to Mayadin with her husband. They would later move to Susah

June 2018

Sharmeena Begum and Amira Abase are last seen alive by Shamima Begum. In late 2018, Shamima Begum’s first child dies

Feb 14 2019

Shamima Begum, 19, tells The Times she wants to return to the UK to have her third child. In a Syrian refugee camp, she says she doesn’t regret joining Isil and believes Amira Abase and Sharmeena are alive