Persona non grata
Shamima Begum is being held in one of two camps in north-east Syria for foreign women who joined IS and their children.
The camps, al-hol and Roj, hold about 42,200 foreign nationals, of whom 30,900 are Iraqis.
About 20 to 25 British women are thought to be among them, although at least 10 are believed to have been stripped of their citizenship.
It was in al-hol camp that Begum, 20, was discovered in February 2019. Until then, her fate after she fled her home in Bethnal Green, London, in 2015 as a 15-year-old to join IS with two other teenage girls was largely unknown.
When she reached Raqqa, the capital of the so-called caliphate, Begum married Yago Riedijk, an IS fighter.
A heavily pregnant Begum was among thousands of IS supporters who surrendered to the Syrian Democratic Forces, which fought to capture the last of the extremist group’s territory.
She said she wished to return to the UK and posed no danger to the British public. But other sources told The Daily Telegraph
she was an enforcer in the IS “morality police” and had tried to recruit women to join, which she denied.
The British
Government stripped her British citizenship as Sajid Javid, then home secretary, said she posed a threat to the UK.
He claimed she had a right to Bangladeshi nationality so his decision would not render her stateless, which is illegal under international law.
Begum’s UK lawyers sought to challenge the ruling. She said she did not know the fate of Amira Abase, her classmate who travelled with her. Kadiza Sultana, the third girl in the group, is believed to have been killed in 2017.
After she reportedly received death threats for speaking to the media, authorities moved Begum to the smaller Roj camp, where she gave birth to a baby boy who died soon after.
Begum had already lost two infants from illness and malnutrition.
Since then, she has remained in Roj camp and stopped wearing the niqab.
She said of her unrepentant comments about joining IS: “I had just given birth. I just was afraid for my life.”