Shamima Begum could be set free years after running away to join ISIS terrorists, a former camp guard has said.
In 2015, Begum left the UK for Syria to join the Islamic State (ISIS), where she became the wife of Dutch-born Yago Riedijk. Four years later, she was stripped of her British citizenship and has been battling ever since to try and get the decision overturned. Now, 24 years old, Begum is living in a Syrian detention camp.
But in a recent turn of events, she could be “running free within days”, according to a Kurdish-Syrian former guard. After the fall of President Assad to Turkish-backed forces last month, Begum could be released by her own guards.
Shamima Begum won’t be allowed back into UK says David Lammy after US ‘ally’ call
She left Bethnal Green and fled to Syria with two friends at the age of 15
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The Kurdish-led Syrian Defence Force (SDF), who runs the detention camps, has come under attack by Turkish airstrikes in recent days and ground assault by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the new Syrian government. Speaking to the Daily Express, a former guard said: “If HTS and the Turks get close to the prison camps, the SDF could release all the prisoners. If they feel they can’t defend the camps because they need to defend their homes and loved ones, they will open the gates of hell.”
Begum is held in al-Roj camp alongside 20 British women, 40 children and thousands of ISIS female detainees. In 2015, she left east London with her close friends from Bethnal Green Academy, Kadiza Sultana, 16, and Amira Abase, 15, to travel to Istanbul, Turkey, to join one of the most savage terrorist groups in history.
She ignored her family’s warnings that Syria was a “dangerous place” and married the notoriously hardline IS member, Riedijk, 27. They had three children together, who all later died, before the couple split. Begum claimed he was arrested for spying and was tortured.
In ITV’s documentary The Return: Life After ISIS, Shamima cried when talking about the deaths of her children and said that she wanted to kill herself because of the grief. On the death of her third child, she said: “He was my last hope, he was the only thing keeping me alive. I didn’t know how. That day I just cried for all my children. I cried for all of them. No one could help me, no one could do anything.”
She drastically changed her look in 2023 and started wearing a cap instead of a hijab
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In 2019, Begum was found by a British journalist in a refugee camp after IS lost the ground war in Syria, alerting the Government to the fact that she was still alive. Begum’s British citizenship was then stripped, and she was banned from entering Britain after being deemed a threat to the nation.
In a 2019 interview, Begum told the BBC she was drawn to the terror group’s promise of a ‘good life’. When asked if the ‘beheading videos’ also attracted her, she replied: “Not just the beheading videos, the videos that show families and stuff in the park. The good life that they can provide for you. Not just the fighting videos, but yeah the fighting videos as well I guess.”
At the time, her mother urged the government to reconsider the decision to revoke her citizenship. A letter to the Home Office from the family’s lawyer – written on behalf of Asma Begum – asked the Home Office to do so as “an act of mercy” following the loss of her children.
Previously, her sister Renu Begum said the family made every “fathomable effort” to stop Shamima Begum from joining ISIS. “That year we lost Shamima to a murderous and misogynistic cult,” she told the Home Secretary in a letter. “My sister has been in their thrall now for four years, and it is clear to me that her exploitation at their hands has fundamentally damaged her.”
Begum will never return to British soil despite multiple attempts to revoke her citizenship
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In 2020, the Court of Appeal permitted her to return to the UK to appeal her revoked citizenship. Then in 2021, the Supreme Court overturned this, finding national security fears outweighed the right to an effective hearing.
In 2021, Begum agreed to be photographed in a detention camp in Syria and was pictured with a drastically different look – head uncovered, in sunglasses and Western clothes. She denied her Westernised physical appearance, which was in stark contrast to her traditional Islamic style previously, was a publicity stunt.
“I have not been wearing hijab for maybe more than a year now. I took it off for myself, because I felt very constricted in the hijab, I felt like I was not myself,” she said. “And I feel like it makes me happy, to not wear the hijab. I’m not doing it for anyone but myself. I’ve had many opportunities to let people take pictures of me without my hijab on, but I did not.”
In February 2023, she lost a challenge against the decision. Begum’s lawyer said her battle was far from over and would be challenging the judgement. Their statement read: “Regrettably, this is a lost opportunity to put into reverse a profound mistake and a continuing injustice.”
Now she could be freed following an attack on the detention camp housing ISIS detainees in Syria
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In March of that year, the BBC tracked down Shamima’s friend, Sharmeena Begum, who first inspired her to quit the UK and join ISIS. She branded her former pal as a “failed ISIS bride on benefits” and told the undercover reporter: “They’re making her seem too jihadi when she was nothing. She didn’t even have a suicide vest. She couldn’t even speak Arabic, so how could she be religious police. The woman could barely speak around people who were European because she was socially awkward. She always stayed in her house, her husband didn’t allow her to go out.”
Then in October 2023, Begum appealed against the decision once more. Her legal team claimed the Home Office failed to consider the legal duties owed to Begum as a potential trafficking victim and called it ‘unlawful’. At the time, The Guardian reported that Begum was in Kurdish custody in north-east Syria and she regretted her decision to run away. The publication said she would “rather die than go back to IS” and would be willing to face terror charges in British court if necessary.
In August 2024, judges ruled that Begum would not be allowed to revoke her citizenship on national security grounds. But her solicitor Daniel Furner said: “We are not going to stop fighting until she does get justice and until she is safely back home.”
However, Foreign Secretary David Lammy has said this week that Begum will not be allowed back in the UK. He told ITV’s Good Morning Britain: “Shamima Begum will not be coming back to the UK. It’s gone right through the courts. She’s not a UK national. We will not be bringing her back to the UK. We’re really clear about that. We will act in our security interests. And many of those in those camps are dangerous, are radicals.”