Bangladeshi-origin Shamima’s application to the UK was rejected – 2024-02-24 19:12:26

Bangladeshi-born British girl Shamima Begum went to Syria in February 2015 with two school friends to join the Islamic State. Later the British government revoked his citizenship citing security reasons.

Shamima, now 24 years old of Bangladeshi origin, appealed against this decision. On Friday (February 23), London’s Court of Appeal rejected the appeal. Shamima’s lawyers raised five arguments. All have been dismissed.

While delivering the judgement, Judge Soo Ka said that while it could be argued that the verdict in Shamima Begum’s case was harsh, it could also be argued that Begum herself was responsible for her own misfortune.

But the job of this court is not to agree or disagree with either view, our only job is to assess whether the decision to deprive was illegal or not, he said. We conclude that it was not (illegal) and the appeal is dismissed.

Shamima can now appeal to the Supreme Court if she wants.

In 2019, the British authorities revoked Shamima Begum’s British citizenship after pictures of her in a Syrian refugee camp were published. Shamima appealed against this last October.

After going to Syria, Shamima married an IS member. They had three children, though none survived.

After her British citizenship was revoked in February 2019, Shamima said she became stateless. But in 2020 a UK tribunal ruled that he was not stateless because he was ‘a citizen of Bangladesh by descent’ due to his Bangladeshi mother when it was decided to revoke his citizenship.

Shamima lost the challenge to the Special Immigration Appeals Commission last year. He is currently in a refugee camp in Syria.

Around 900 people have traveled from Britain to Syria and Iraq to join IS. About 150 of them have had their British citizenship revoked, it is official.

Sources: BBC, Deutsche Welle, CNN

MSM