Begum gives ‘full account’ of how she joined IS in podcast
THE BBC is to broadcast an unprecedented 10-part interview with a former Islamic State (IS) bride who fled Britain to marry a jihadi fighter.
Shamima Begum, now 23, left the UK at the age of 15 with two school friends to join IS in Syria and had her British citizenship revoked when she resurfaced in a refugee camp in 2019.
She continues to be held at the al-roj camp in northern Syria – which is run by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) – and has now given “her most extensive series of interviews yet” to the BBC.
The Shamima Begum Story, released today on BBC Sounds, is a weekly pod- cast, hosted by the investigative journalist Josh Baker, which will explore Ms Begum’s story in forensic detail.
The BBC claimed the podcast would provide Ms Begum’s “full account” of “what really happened” when she disappeared from London.
The broadcaster added: “This is not a platform for Shamima Begum to give her unchallenged story. This is a robust, public interest investigation into who she really is and what she really did.”
Ms Begum will describe how IS members fed her detailed instructions about how to avoid detection during her journey to Syria and she explains how she prepared to flee the country.
She tells the podcast that she stuffed her suitcase full of chocolate that she knew she would not be able to find once she joined the terrorist group in the Middle East. She said: “Mint Aero, mint chocolate, like a lot. You can find a lot of things in this country but you cannot find mint chocolate. It’s a tragedy.”
Ms Begum also uses the podcast to stress that she is no longer a threat to Britain’s national security.
She will say: “[People perceive me] as a danger, as a risk, as a potential risk to them, to their safety, to their way of living. I’m not this person that they think I am being perceived as in the media, you know I’m just so much more than Isis.”