Jeremy Corbyn Backs UK Return of Islamic State Bride Shamima Begum

Shamima Begum
Laura Lean - WPA Pool/Getty Images
Simon Kent

Islamic State bride Shamima Begum should be allowed back into Britain and given all the “support that she needs,” UK Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn said Thursday.

The teenager, who gave birth to a baby boy in a Syria refugee camp on Sunday, had “a right to return” after fleeing the country to support Islamic terrorism in the Middle East, Mr. Corbyn said.

“She was born in Britain, she has that right to remain in Britain and obviously a lot of questions she has to answer but also some support that she needs,” he told ITV. He said any move to strip her of citizenship is a “very extreme manoeuvre”:

She obviously has, in my view, a right to return to Britain. On that return she must face a lot of questions about everything she’s done. And at that point any action may or may not be taken.

I think the idea of stripping somebody of their citizenship when they were born in Britain is a very extreme manoeuvre.

Indeed I question the right of the home secretary to have these powers when the original law was brought in by Theresa May when she was home secretary.

Shadow home secretary Diane Abbott joined her leader in calling for the repatriation of  Begum, saying the government “could not subvert the rule of law” just because it is “not convenient.”

She told BBC Radio 4’s World At One: “You cannot strip people of their British nationality under international law if it will leave them stateless.

“That’s the legal position and we are a country of laws.”

The future of the jihadi runaway has been in doubt since Wednesday when the British Home Secretary wrote to the parents of Begum to inform them their daughter’s UK citizenship has been revoked.

Sajid Javid, the Conservative minister responsible for UK home affairs made the decision after a week of intense public interest in the requests by Begum, made via a series of media interviews, that she wanted to return to the United Kingdom to enjoy a quiet life with her child.

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