UK terrorism adviser opposes Shamima Begum's exclusion from Britain

UK Government terrorism laws' reviewer Jonathan Hall KC has opined that Shamima Begum should be allowed to return to the UK as the policy of keeping people like her at a "strategic distance" is becoming increasingly untenable, The Guardian reports.

Shamima, who fled her east London home aged 15 to join Islamic State (IS) in Syria,  is one of an estimated 900 Britons who travelled to join IS, half of whom have since returned. 

Amid a growing number of calls against the government's decision to revoke Begum's British citizenship, the independent reviewer of terrorism legislation said in a speech on Monday that Shamima could still pose a risk even though she is overseas and that "repatriation, if it took place, should not be confused with moral absolution".

He observed that Britain is out of step with other western countries which are taking back former IS recruits. Moreover, Shamima's gender identity may be a factor to consider.

Jonathan Hall said, "The UK's experience is that women are far less likely to carry out attacks or any other sort of terrorist offending – in the 20 years to September 2022 there were 1,004 men versus 89 women convicted of terrorism.

"Compared with men, women are less likely to have travelled for purpose of fighting; are less likely to have played [a] battlefield role; may well have had less autonomy in being able to leave; and now make up majority of those UK-linked individuals detained."

He further added that "The status quo does not eliminate risk … Plotting in detention may be easier than plotting at home."

According to Jonathan Hall, those who travelled to join IS needed to be removed from that environment and Shamima's return may also offer something for those outraged by her actions.

The decision – upheld last week by a special tribunal – was also condemned by former supreme court justice Jonathan Sumption.

In a letter to the Guardian, he wrote, "The home secretary cannot deprive a person of British citizenship if it would render them stateless …Children who make a terrible mistake are surely redeemable."

"When the decision was made, in 2019, Ms Begum was a citizen of Bangladesh, but only in the most technical sense. She had provisional citizenship until she was 21, when it would lapse unless she took it up … But she has never been to Bangladesh. She has no links with the country. And Bangladesh has disowned her.

"Her Bangladeshi citizenship always was a legal fiction. Today, it is not even that. She is 23. As a result of the home secretary's decision, she is stuck in a camp in Syria, with no citizenship anywhere and no prospect of one. Children who make terrible mistakes are surely redeemable. But statelessness is for ever."

Shamima Begum left her home in Bethnal Green with two schoolfriends after being lured by online terrorist propaganda, travelling through Turkey before joining IS in Syria n 2015. She married a terrorist fighter and had three children, all of whom died as infants.

Now living in a refugee camp in Syria, Shamima says she regrets her decision and wants to return to the UK, even if to be prosecuted.

However, the government revoked her British citizenship in 2019, claiming because she had Bangladeshi heritage she would not be left stateless. 

The government's decision is alleged to have followed advice from the security services about the danger Begum poses.