The british government’s attitude over this confuses me*. At a time when I am repeatedly reminded in my job that 15yr olds who are becoming embroiled in gang activity involving drugs and firearms in our own country are victims of criminal exploitation and shouldn’t be vilified and criminalised (and yes that is pretty much the policy at ground level), they are trying to strip this young woman of her British citizenship and refuse her entry to the country that she previously called home. Of course, her actions were abhorrent but what she did, she did when she was a child and  we shouldn’t underestimate how sophisticated IS tactics will be in influencing young minds (in the same way a child is groomed by an online paedophile or a gang who direct a 15yr old to be involved in serious criminality) . She was influenced by people while living in the UK and to deny her access to return home (and if circumstances suffice to stand trial) is appalling frankly.

*not really. I’m not naive enough to not realise that this is a cynical tactic to exploit the public hysteria and gain some much needed public support from the right.

Yes, there is definitely a big element of blame the victim. As for removing citizenship, can we start to do that for anyone else that acts in a way we don’t like?

Yes, there is definitely a big element of blame the victim

I’d say the victim is the guy who’s head was in the bin she saw..or the many other victims of their barbaric regime.

If law dictates we should have her back we should, and if we do i hope she goes on trial. But lets not paint this girl as the victim please

I’d say the victim is the guy who’s head was in the bin she saw

Me too, and her justification for that was that “they” would have raped and killed *her* if they’d got to her. …and yet when she was finally captured she wasn’t raped or killed. As far as we can tell she was treated very well.

As for removing citizenship, can we start to do that for anyone else that acts in a way we don’t like?

As long as we don’t leave them stateless, seemingly yes. Probably something you want to do sparingly or everyone will start doing it.

At a time when I am repeatedly reminded in my job that 15yr olds who are becoming embroiled in gang activity involving drugs and firearms in our own country are victims of criminal exploitation and shouldn’t be vilified and criminalised

In your job maybe. …but in general they are (literally) criminalized and they are vilified.

It’s possible for them both to be victims tpbiker, obviously one crime far worse than the other.

Regardless as a British citizen she should be brought back here and tried. If javid has enough information to perceive her as a threat or about crimes she’s committed then he should put her in court. She’s our problem we should deal with her.

I’m sceptical about his motives myself, he’s recently lost 2 cases where he was unable to do this to 2 Isis fighters? who were genuine Bangladeshi dual nationals, im sure he knows this will be lost on appeal, but he has a voter base to appease.

If she had left the UK over 16 it would be different.how ‘Groomed’ she was the police already have info but she willingly left the UK to sign up to a horrendously brutal group of religious nutters.
If as an adult she’s committed crimes there (and it was such a brutal regime she may well be complicit) then lock her up, put her kid in care & move on.
Trying her on the basis of newspaper interviews & populist outcries is a crappy way to dispense justice.
We should be better than that.

We should be better than that.

We should, but … Sajid Javid …

We shouldn’t have removed her citizenship unilaterally, we should have come to an agreement with Bangladesh to take her. Why is it okay for us to shirk our responsibility for someone made in the UK and pawn her off as Bangladesh’s problem?

As for removing citizenship, can we start to do that for anyone else that acts in a way we don’t like?

Only for people that are a funny tinge, less British than the rest of us. At least Norman Tebbitt allowed foreigners to take a “cricket support” test.

I’m sceptical about his motives myself, he’s recently lost 2 cases where he was unable to do this to 2 Isis fighters? who were genuine Bangladeshi dual nationals, im sure he knows this will be lost on appeal, but he has a voter base to appease.

It’s a delaying and vote winning tactic. Possibly *might* encourage her and her husband to go to the Netherlands instead of the Uk.

If as an adult she’s committed crimes there (and it was such a brutal regime she may well be complicit) then lock her up, put her kid in care & move on.

I don’t think anyone wants to put her on trial and/or lock her up. Syria (quite reasonably) want rid of all their foreign fighters, the less nutters they have on their soil the better. The Uk don’t want to try her and lock her up because then we have to keep her and she can spread her hate in prison, and then who knows where once she leaves. the only argument is as a deterrent, how the hell is prison a deterrent for someone who literally joined a genocidal death cult and regards death as desirable martyrdom. I don’t see the benefit to either the Uk or Syria of putting her on trial in either country.

Trying her on the basis of newspaper interviews & populist outcries is a crappy way to dispense justice.

Nobody is advocating trying her on that basis, or any other. All the countries involved are trying to do is avoid having this family in their society.

we should have come to an agreement with Bangladesh to take her

Cos UK is sheeeet hot at working out international agreements at the moment,

Take her in for us?
No
Take her in for us?
No
Take her in for us?
No
Take her in for us?
No

Repeat for many months.

A senior lawyer was on R4 this morning saying that he can only think this is Sajid Javid trying to look tough. In doing so Javid has created a bigger problem; the girl does not have Bangladeshi nationality and the Bangladesh government wants nothing to do with her so the British Government has broken international law by making her stateless.

I’ve been swinging between viewpoints on this, mostly against the girl but this has made me realise that we should be doing the Christian thing and admitting her, albeit with all the due processes of law, and attempting to reeducate her, not shun her.

I have less sympathy than I did for her after listening to the anti-terror officer & deradicalisarion worker on R4 last night.
But my opinion of Javid has sunk even lower this looks more & more like populist politicking.

All the countries involved are trying to do is avoid having this family in their society.

Just as she needs to take responsibility for what she has done, she is a British citizen, we have to take responsibility for her.

Just as she needs to take responsibility for what she has done, she is a British citizen, we have to take responsibility for her.

Yup, unfortunately so.

Javid has sunk even lower this looks more & more like populist politicking.

Which is exactly what he was aiming for, some nasty right wing political finger prodding.

He was hardly know to the general public before his position (taken up after another hysterical MP) and now he feels he has some power he’s acting like a string puppet followed by all the other racist right wingers the UK has to offer.

Its what you voted for, you can hardly blame him for acting in the manner you chose for him to follow can you.

I hate ITV with a passion, but it was on this morning and some right nasty vocal gobshite was literally talking over every other comment and proclaiming “she knew the right answer etc.)

Which is essentially what right wingers do, vocalise thier own small minded opinions over the top of any conversation going.

Good thing about this topic is it once again divides the country further into secular society where division is favoured over co-operation.

Thats the Tory’s for you.

I have less sympathy than I did for her after listening to the anti-terror officer & deradicalisarion worker on R4 last night.

Was that moral maze? I had to chuckle at her naming the Boy “Giver of Wounds”. Given the situation you’d think that she might have chosen Nigel, or Dave or Graham.

I’m actually surprised somebody in the government flicked the light switch on for a moment. Her uncle in Luton will not be happy now as he could have been lifting the rent for her new furnished apartment from the treasury. It will only be a matter of time when the starry eyed in downing street will cave in and overrule the decision.

It will only be a matter of time when the starry eyed in downing street will cave in and overrule the verdict.

Did I miss the trial?

mostly against the girl but this has made me realise that we should be doing the Christian thing and massing an army of crusaders in Cyprus

FTFY etc 🙂

We should follow international law, because, well, if we don’t we can’t complain when other countries treat British citizens badly in the future.

If she presents herself in a country where we can provide consular assistance, then she should be repatriated and dealt with by the courts.

But lets not paint this girl as the victim please

Let’s do, as that is what she is. She is a victim of radicalisation and grooming.

Of course it is easier to just shout “hang her” than actually try and deal with it correctly.

She is a victim of radicalisation and grooming.

I’ve not seen the evidence for this. Maybe you can post the detail of the radicalisation and grooming she underwent so we can make up our own minds.

But we wouldn’t be making her stateless by refusing her re-entry into Britain would we. She turned her back on us to go and join Islamic State (The clue’s in the title). The fact that I.S. has almost collapsed would seem to be the point at which she was made stateless. Wherever she physically stands is where she should be dealt with (with U.N. help if necessary).
You could argue that I.S. was never a globally recognized sovereign state as such, however for her it meant even more than that and for countless thousands who died it was very much a real thing.

Which is essentially what right wingers do, vocalise thier own small minded opinions over the top of any conversation going.

To be fair the left do that in equal measure

Let’s do, as that is what she is. She is a victim of radicalisation and grooming.

Of course it is easier to just shout “hang her” than actually try and deal with it correctly.

Shes no more the victim of her environment than I’d wage 90% of other criminals. Ie –

Grow up in underprivileged family, turn to drugs as all your peers are doing them, steal bike to fund habit = scum of earth

Grow up with fairly religious family, see some beheading videos, get chatting to radical nutters and persuaded to come live in the new Islamic state = victim

You could argue that I.S. was never a globally recognized sovereign state as such,

I’m sure some crack international lawyers would indeed suggest this. If the UK hadn’t refused (rightly), along with everyone else, to recognise IS, then we might be in a stronger position to argue against it.

What it boils down to is whether we, as a state, are prepared to respect international law even when it isn’t necessarily in our interests to do so, or would prefer our Home Secretary to jettison it to get some nice headlines in the Mail and The Sun at a time when we may be swiftly approaching a Tory leadership election…

we should be doing the right thing and admitting her, albeit with all the due processes of law, and attempting to reeducate her, not shun her.

Fixed. Christianity has bugger all to do with it.

I’ve not seen the evidence for this. Maybe you can post the detail of the radicalisation and grooming she underwent so we can make up our own minds.

Without bringing her home & speaking to her that might be slightly difficult.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-34845670

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-31569808

but this has made me realise that we should be doing the Christian thing and admitting her

Then following the programme the Home Secretary espoused in his paper quoted above. He is a despicable little man who wouldn’t know statesmanship if it hit him in the face with a copy of the Qu’uaran.

I’ve not seen the evidence for this. Maybe you can post the detail of the radicalisation and grooming she underwent so we can make up our own minds.

What the intel that the local police, school and possibly other council employees had before she left for Syria and has been reported in the news? Do try to keep up!

But we wouldn’t be making her stateless by refusing her re-entry into Britain would we. She turned her back on us to go and join Islamic State (The clue’s in the title).

IS is not a nation state, regardless of what they choose to call themselves. So yes, we would be making her stateless.

I once went to an 808 State gig, so now I’m slightly crapping myself in case Sajid Javid decides to look into my unpaid parking tickets 🙁

What the intel that the local police, school and possibly other council employees had before she left for Syria and has been reported in the news?

Well go on, link to it.

In the article above they specifically say they don’t know:

“further down the line we are still no clearer what the agents of that change [the radicalisation] were.”

If the guys investigating don’t know, how does Kerley know?

A guy on R4 a few weeks back said western recruits were largely ‘self radicalised’. If this Isis member is different I’d be interested in knowing exactly how.

A senior lawyer was on R4 this morning saying that he can only think this is Sajid Javid trying to look tough

Best point he was imagine the reverse. Bangladeshi national goes to Syria, they revoke his nationality because, well he can still apply for British Nationality. Sajiv’s response? Aside from a Daily Mail comments meltdown would be what exactly?

On the International Stage, Britain is again found wanting. I suppose we should be used to it by now. I pick up the mess after my dog… The country choses not to pick up the mess of its citizens.

I’ve not seen the evidence for this. Maybe you can post the detail of the radicalisation and grooming she underwent so we can make up our own minds.

It’s not exactly water-tight evidence, but it seems rather likely from what we know currently.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sharmeena_Begum [the first girl to leave]

[The other] Begum is believed to have been grieving the death of her 33-year-old mother in January 2014 of cancer and was targeted by islamic preachers and online extremists who had taken advantage of her fragile state.
…
Begum’s father believes Begum was groomed by two young women extremists who targeted her via social media on her phone who took her to the airport and made sure she caught the flight to Turkey.
…
GCSE pupils Amira Abase, Shamima Begum and Kadiza Sultana were believed to have joined her in ISIL’ de facto capital of Raqqa, in Syria in February. The four girls, all pupils at Bethnal Green Academy in east London, were close friends
…
according to a report by Omar Wahid, in August 2015 Begum was indoctrinated into radical thinking at East London Mosque in Whitechapel by a women’s group from the Islamic Forum of Europe (IFE). She then allegedly persuaded her three friends to join her at the meetings at the mosque.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amira_Abase,_Shamima_Begum_and_Kadiza_Sultana [our Shamina and the other two friends]

Their disappearance has been attributed to Aqsa Mahmood, a woman from Glasgow who joined ISIL in 2013. There have been electronic communications between the girls and Mahmood.[4] Mahmood faces criminal charges if she returns.

It’s not exactly water-tight evidence,

It’s certainly not, and the stuff that is credible in it relates to a completely different woman.

The people who tried to find out don’t know how she formed her world view:

“further down the line we are still no clearer what the agents of that change [the radicalisation] were.”

We have no idea if she was groomed or not. We *do* know that most western volunteers *aren’t* radicalized by specific others, they do their own research.

One more point on this. If she was radicalised and of the opinion that ISIS were ‘good’ and there wasn’t an alternative POV which showed them as being a genocidal death cult why didn’t she tell her parents she had strong sympathy for them? The fact she couldn’t tell her parents is clear evidence she knew there was a strong case against Isis – so strong that there is no way her parents would accept the case that Isis were ‘good’.

It’s certainly not, and the stuff that is credible in it relates to a completely different woman.

Agreed, but the four were seemingly close friends and by the sounds of it were exposed to broadly similar influences.

It’s superficial evidence at best I know, but as I said, it seems pretty likely IHMO.

The fact she couldn’t tell her parents is clear evidence she knew there was a strong case against Isis – so strong that there is no way her parents would accept the case that Isis were ‘good’.

That’s even more superficial than what I just linked to. There’s a dozen reasons why a 15-year old girl might not want tell her parents she was planning to flit to another country, not least of which being “she’s 15.” Concluding it was purely because she knew she was joining an evil death cult is a bit of a leap.

If she was planning on doing a bunk to go live in the South of France because she wanted to live somewhere Sunni sunny, I expect that she’d still have kept it from her parents because they’d surely have tried to prevent her from going.

Best point he was imagine the reverse. Bangladeshi national goes to Syria, they revoke his nationality because, well he can still apply for British Nationality. Sajiv’s response? Aside from a Daily Mail comments meltdown would be what exactly?

For me the “imagine the reverse” situation is:
1. Someone travels to the UK from Nigeria
2. That someone is suspected (but not convicted in a Nigerian court) of committing crimes in the UK
3. The Nigerian government therefore says “Mr X is no longer Nigerian, we have removed his Nigerian citizenship for doing bad things. He chose to go to the UK so he can apply to be British”.
4. The UK now can’t deport him, no matter what crimes he convicted of, because he’s no longer Nigerian.

Does that sound sensible? Would Sajid Javid be happy with that? Or is it just the UK that gets to stop foreigners coming here and also keep UK citizens out, while other coutnries need to take our criminals and keep their own too.

This isn’t about defending the woman in question, it’s about whether the UK government should follow international laws. And it’s hard to debate because it often turns into “Oh, you love terrorists do you? Well why don’t you go to Syria to join them eh?!”.

As others have said Javid almost definitely knows he’ll lose this on appeal, but it makes him look good to the Daily Mail and it gives him the ECHR ‘bogeyman’ thing to use in election/leaderhsip campaigns.

That’s even more superficial than what I just linked to.

I think it’s slightly less superficial but that doesn’t matter because I’m not saying she wasn’t radicalised by someone else. I’m saying we don’t know and that the people who looked into it found no evidence that she was.

There’s a dozen reasons why a 15-year old girl might not want tell her parents she was planning to flit to another country,

“had strong sympathy for them” != “flit to another country”.

Well go on, link to it.

You do know that the sources for the police intel are likely to be security classified? All we have is local news reports and I’m not willing to risk a long stretch at Her Majesties pleasure just to provide you with evidence. In the words of ‘our’ tin-foil hat wearer and conspiracy theorist, “Do your own research”.

It’s all murky and we can’t say with any certainty one way or the other what was in the misguided youth’s mind when she went off to be an ISIS bride. I’m more inclined to go with Cougar’s explanation above than the emotional populist stuff that our Home Secretary is currently spouting.

I once went to an 808 State gig, so now I’m slightly crapping myself in case Sajid Javid decides to look into my unpaid parking tickets

That’s nothing. I’m stuck in Mu Mu Land after the KLF were put on the proscribed groups list halfway through a gig at the Free Trade Hall.

You do know that the sources for the police intel are likely to be security classified?

Yup, there is no evidence, or at least no evidence that we have access to.

Quod grātīs asseritur, grātīs negātur.

What we *do* know is what’s in the public domain from the link above which is:
“further down the line we are still no clearer what the agents of that change [the radicalisation] were.”

What we *do* know is what’s in the public domain from the link above which is:
“further down the line we are still no clearer what the agents of that change [the radicalisation] were.”

So using logic – what we do know is that she is a British Citizen, therefore she should come home to face justice in our courts of law.

Shes a good Apple!! 🍎