The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) has been accused of giving terrorists a platform following the release of a new 10-part podcast with former British national Shamima Begum.
Begum fled the U.K. in 2015 with two other schoolgirls to join the Islamic State death cult in Syria and, following its demise, sought to return to Britain to face terror charges. Her citizenship was revoked by then-Home Secretary Sajid Javid, a decision that was upheld on appeal to Britain’s top court in February 2021.
A key factor in the decision to strip Begum of her British citizenship was the fact that she held dual citizenship with Bangladesh, meaning she would not be made stateless by the action taken by the U.K. Home Office.
The decision sparked outrage among the British left, who argued Begum, to quote Labour’s former shadow Home Secretary Diane Abbott, was a “desperate groomed teenager” and there were “plenty of good reasons” to allow her to “return home.”
At the time of the revocation of Begum’s citizenship, Sajid Javid told the House of Commons the decision was “morally right, absolutely right, but also legally correct and the right one to protect the British people.
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“I won’t go into details of the case, but what I will say is that you certainly haven’t seen what I saw,” he told lawmakers, adding: “If you did know what I knew, because you are sensible, responsible people, you would have made exactly the same decision – of that I have no doubt.”
The vast majority of the British public have remained opposed to allowing Begum to return to Britain, with a YouGov poll conducted in November 2020 showing 70 percent of Brits were against her homecoming.
Since fleeing ISIS, Begum has resided at the al-Roj camp in northern Syria, run by the Syrian Democratic Forces. She has frequently been approached for interviews by major Western broadcasters where she has been able to tell her side of the story as to why she should not be deemed dangerous in the eyes of concerned Brits.
Read more: RMX
