Lawyer for family of IS teenager demands government apology
Home Secretary Sajid Javid has been accused of “human fly- tipping” over the decision to revoke the British citizenship of runaway Islamic State bride Shamima Begum.
Ms Begum, 19, was one of t hree s c hoolgirl s t o l e ave Bethnal Green to join the terrorist group in 2015. She was f ound i n a Syrian r ef ugee camp earlier this year.
Mr Javid cancelled the teenager’s British citizenship in February – a move only permissible under international law if it does not leave the individual stateless.
Mohammed Akunjee, a lawyer representing the family of Ms Begum, has called for the decision to be overturned and an apology offered, accusing Mr Javid of using the case to further his political career.
I n a l e t t e r publ i s hed by a national newspaper, Mr Akunjee wrote: “Your act represents the most profoundly egregious, capricious and politically- driven abuse of power.
“It was a unilateral, unprincipled response to the publishing of [ reporter] Mr Loyd’s interview [ with Ms Begum in a refugee camp], deployed as an artifice or device to further your own personal political objective of being prime minister.”
Ms B e gum, t hen heavil y pregnant, was interviewed at the Al- Roj camp in northern Syria on 13 February this year. She said she wished to return to the UK, as the self- styled caliphate collapsed.
Mr Akunjee wrote that she feared the quality of healthcare which would be available to her then unborn child, given her first and second child had both died. The baby, named Jarrah, was born on 16 February but died of pneumonia on 8 March, the letter said.
Stripping an individual of their citizenship is only legal if they have a second one. It was thought Ms Begum may have a claim to Bangladesh citizenship because of her family background, but Bangladeshi officials denied this.
T h e l e t t e r c o n t i n u e d : “Shamima Begum’s parents never contemplated a life for her in Bangladesh. They did not register her birth with the Bangladeshi High Commission. They did not take her to Bangladesh on holiday as a child. Indeed, she has never visited the country.”
It added: “Rather than take responsibility for Shamima Begum and her son, you took a British problem and illegally dumped it on our innocent international neighbours.
“You have dishonourably left it to the Kurdish people to bear the financial and security burden of Shamima’s safety and upkeep … Your cynical decision amounts to human flytipping.”