{UAH} Isis bride Shamima Begum ‘says she is rape victim’ as she launches legal bid over British citizenship

Frank Mujabi/ Mayimuna/ Afuwa/ Edward Mo irundrua,

 

Isis bride Shamima Begum has opened her legal challenge to the Home office revocation of her citizenship with an unexpected and surprise legal  strategy. In her new strategy, Shamima practically renounces Isis and her previous defiant defence of her the terrorist organisation. She is instead  arguing in court that she too is a victim of Isis, and a victim of Islam, and that, far from being an Isis wife, she was a child victim of rape, who was violated by a monster and  who the British state did nothing to protect from harm. By revoking her citizenship, and making her stateless, the British state is compounding its errors and committing an unforgivable violation of her rights as a citizen. She is arguing it is the duty of the British state to save her from monsters and barbaric cults, not to condemn her and throw her into the wilderness.

Bobby

 

Isis bride Shamima Begum 'says she is rape victim' as she launches legal bid over British citizenship

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Shamima Begum begins a legal challenge against the removal of her citizenship (Picture: BBC)

Isis bride Shamima Begum is set to begin her legal challenge to get back her British citizenship, as her lawyer said she was a victim of rape by her terrorist husband.

Ms Begum, 20, fled east London as a schoolgirl four years ago for Syria to join Isis. She was found in a Syrian refugee camp in February after living under Isis rule for more than three years.

Former home secretary Sajid Javid revoked her citizenship later that month, prompting her family to take legal action against the Home Office in a bid to overturn the decision.

She later claimed she had been brainwashed by Isis and that she wanted to return to the UK for a "second chance".

Her family's lawyer, Tasnime Akunjee, told the Daily Mirror: "She was married in an Isis ceremony within two weeks of reaching Syria to a 23-year-old fighter. Her context is as a rape victim, or a statutory rape victim."

Her legal team will argue she should be allowed to return from Syria to give evidence.

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Shamima Begum left the UK at the age of 15 (Picture: PA)

On Tuesday, the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC), a specialist court which hears challenges to decisions to remove someone's British citizenship on national security grounds, will hold a four-day preliminary hearing in London.

Mrs Justice Elisabeth Laing is expected to deal with, among other things, whether depriving Ms Begum of her British citizenship rendered her stateless and was therefore unlawful.

Individuals appealing to SIAC usually remain anonymous - however, it is understood that Ms Begum has waived her right to anonymity.

Ms Begum, then aged 15, was one of three schoolgirls – along with Kadiza Sultana and Amira Abase – from Bethnal Green Academy who left their homes and families in February 2015 to join a fourth Bethnal Green schoolgirl, Sharmeena Begum, who had left London in 2014, in Syria.

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In February, Ms Begum was found by The Times, nine months pregnant, at a refugee camp, telling the newspaper that she would "do anything required just to be able to come home".

Ms Begum said she was married 10 days after arriving in Raqqa to a Dutchman who had converted to Islam, Yago Riedijk, who she claimed was later arrested, charged with spying and tortured.

Three children died

She eventually left Raqqa in January 2017 with her husband but her children, a girl aged a year and nine months old and a three-month-old boy, both died.

Her third child, a son, also died shortly after he was born.

Ms Begum told The Times she had "mostly" lived a "normal life in Raqqa, every now and then bombing and stuff".

She added: "But when I saw my first severed head in a bin it didn't faze me at all. It was from a captured fighter seized on the battlefield, an enemy of Islam. I thought only of what he would have done to a Muslim woman if he had the chance."

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Ms Begum fled the UK to join Isis in Syria (Picture: PA)

The Home Office revoked her British citizenship later in February – a decision which is only lawful if it did not leave Ms Begum stateless.

It was speculated at the time that Ms Begum may have Bangladeshi citizenship, but Bangladesh's minister of state for foreign affairs Shahriar Alam has denied this.

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