By Amran Abdiqadir Mohamed, BA Global Development and Social Anthropology
Shamima Begum is a former British citizen who has caused much controversy over the best part of the last decade. Born and raised in Bethnal Green, East London, Begum fled the UK in 2015 to join the Islamic Extremist group ‘IS’ in Syria. Aged 15, Begum travelled through Turkey before entering Syria to meet Yago Reidijk, a man whom she met online and would later marry. Begum and Reidjik had 3 children who all died as infants. She has spent most of her time since leaving the UK in various refugee camps in northern Syria.
In 2019, the UK Home Secretary Sajid Javid stripped Begum of her British citizenship on national security grounds. What does this mean? Citizenship is the legal status that allows you to live in a country and access public services such as the NHS and education. For many, citizenship is a large part of their identity. As per international law, the UK can only remove citizenship if the individual is eligible to apply for citizenship elsewhere. This is because the UK is duty-bound not to leave former citizens stateless.
In 2020, a tribunal summary established that as Shamima Begum is a citizen of Bangladesh by descent, she’s entitled to Bangladeshi citizenship and thus is not stateless. How does this work? Essentially, as Shamima Begum’s parents were born in Bangladesh, she was entitled to provisional citizenship until she turned 21. After this, the provisional citizenship lapses, and she’s no longer able to apply for it. Therefore, she was a citizen of Bangladesh in a purely technical sense. It’s important to note that Begum has never visited Bangladesh and, other than her parents, has no links to the country.
In an interview with ABC News, shortly after her citizenship was removed, Begum said, ‘I felt like my whole world fell apart right in front of me. You know, especially the way I was told. I wasn’t even told by a government official. I had to be told by journalists.’
In an interview with ABC News, shortly after her citizenship was removed, Begum said, ‘I felt like my whole world fell apart right in front of me. You know, especially the way I was told. I wasn’t even told by a government official. I had to be told by journalists.’ However, the Bangladeshi Foreign Minister publicly stated that Begum might face the death penalty if she were to enter Bangladesh as they have a zero-tolerance policy concerning terrorist acts.
Begum was not allowed to re-enter the UK to appeal the Home Secretary’s decision to remove her citizenship. Her lawyer has recently challenged the citizenship removal at the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC). They claimed that Javid’s decision was unlawful as Begum was a victim of child trafficking, sexual exploitation and grooming.
The Honourable Justice Jay, a judge of high courts of justice, summarised the SIAC’s assessment of Begum’s case:
- ‘There was a credible suspicion that Ms Begum has been trafficked to Syria’
- ‘The notice for bringing her to Syria was sexual exploitation to which, as a child, she could not give valid consent’
- ‘However, under our constitutional settlement these sensitive issues are for the secretary of state to evaluate and not for the commission’
Begum’s lawyer has announced their intention to appeal this decision, claiming that the UK has left Begum ‘de facto stateless’. This is because she has been denied re-entry to Britain, alongside Bangladesh threatening the death penalty. As Begum is now 23 years old, regardless of the death penalty threat, she no longer has a legal claim to Bangladeshi citizenship. Her lawyer has expressed that their legal case would be aided by political pressure on the Government regarding the judge’s comments on trafficking and sexual exploitation.
The general public had a mixed response to the SIAC’s ruling. Government terrorism law reviewer Jonathan Hall KC argues that the UK should allow Shamima Begum to return for multiple reasons, the first being that she could still pose a threat abroad. In an interview with the Guardian, Hall says, ‘the UK’s experience is that women are far less likely to carry out attacks or any other sort of terrorist offending … the status quo does not eliminate risk… plotting in detention may be easier than plotting at home.’ Hall has also argued that underage citizens who travelled to join IS, need to be removed from that environment and allowed to return to the UK under controlled conditions.
Vice-chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on trafficked Britons in Syria, David Davis, claimed that the SIAC’s decision was shameful and must be remedied as soon as possible. Both Davis and Hall have highlighted that other European countries have, at the very least, allowed ex-citizens to appeal their case in person. As a result of the UK’s justice system, Shamima Begum is left with no country to call home; her fight for citizenship against the UK government continues.
Photo Caption: Shamima Begum (Credit: Dunya News).