UK Urged to Repatriate Daesh Bride From Syria
LONDON (Dispatches) – Britain risks creating "a new Guantanamo” by leaving Shamima Begum and others like her stranded in detention camps in Syria, it has been claimed, after the supreme court rejected Begum’s appeal against a decision to revoke her UK citizenship.
A key figure who has been involved with Begum’s case said the judgment left the 21-year-old in a legal limbo, unable to return to the UK or mount an effective challenge to the deprivation decision remotely.
Maya Foa, the director of the human rights charity Reprieve, said the supreme court had said Begum could in theory still challenge a decision to take away her citizenship, if she could find a way of instructing her lawyers.
"The court has said she can appeal [against] the citizenship decision, but they do not say how it can be done. It leaves her in the hands of the British government, which is unwilling to assist. That is less of a policy and more of an abdication of responsibility – unless the policy is to create a new Guantanamo in Syria,” Foa said.
Begum is understood to have been told of the court judgment, although very little of her personal story featured during the case. Supporters say she regrets her decision to leave the UK and is remorseful about her actions.
They argue that she was a minor when she was a victim of trafficking and was unable to leave Syria after she arrived in 2015, until she was detained by militants as the last of Daesh terrorist group’s territory was captured.
Her legal team has yet to decide what it might do next, including whether it will appeal to the European court of human rights.
An estimated 24 adults and 35 children who left Britain to join Daesh are still detained by militants in Syria at one of several camps run by Kurds, where conditions have been described as dire. Many of them have had their UK citizenship removed.
On Friday the supreme court decided unanimously to rule in favour of the home secretary and against Begum on all counts, in the latest stage of a long-running legal battle.
It means the 21-year-old will not be allowed to re-enter the UK to fight her case in person and cannot have her citizenship restored.
A key figure who has been involved with Begum’s case said the judgment left the 21-year-old in a legal limbo, unable to return to the UK or mount an effective challenge to the deprivation decision remotely.
Maya Foa, the director of the human rights charity Reprieve, said the supreme court had said Begum could in theory still challenge a decision to take away her citizenship, if she could find a way of instructing her lawyers.
"The court has said she can appeal [against] the citizenship decision, but they do not say how it can be done. It leaves her in the hands of the British government, which is unwilling to assist. That is less of a policy and more of an abdication of responsibility – unless the policy is to create a new Guantanamo in Syria,” Foa said.
Begum is understood to have been told of the court judgment, although very little of her personal story featured during the case. Supporters say she regrets her decision to leave the UK and is remorseful about her actions.
They argue that she was a minor when she was a victim of trafficking and was unable to leave Syria after she arrived in 2015, until she was detained by militants as the last of Daesh terrorist group’s territory was captured.
Her legal team has yet to decide what it might do next, including whether it will appeal to the European court of human rights.
An estimated 24 adults and 35 children who left Britain to join Daesh are still detained by militants in Syria at one of several camps run by Kurds, where conditions have been described as dire. Many of them have had their UK citizenship removed.
On Friday the supreme court decided unanimously to rule in favour of the home secretary and against Begum on all counts, in the latest stage of a long-running legal battle.
It means the 21-year-old will not be allowed to re-enter the UK to fight her case in person and cannot have her citizenship restored.