Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
London schoolgirl who fled to join Isis wants to return to UK
Source: The Guardian
London schoolgirl who fled to join Isis wants to return to UK
Shamima Begum, 19, in refugee camp in Syria after fleeing last territory held by Islamic State
Mattha Busby and Vikram Dodd
Thu 14 Feb 2019 00.42 GMT
An east London schoolgirl who left the UK in 2015 to join Islamic State has been tracked down in Syria where she said has no regrets about joining the group, but now wants to come home as she is nine months pregnant.
Shamima Begum, 19, said she fled the jihadists’ last remaining enclave in Baghuz, eastern Syria, as she was tired of life on a battlefield and feared for her unborn child after her two other children died.
“I was weak,” she told the Times from the al-Hawl refugee camp in north-eastern Syria. “I could not endure the suffering and hardship that staying on the battlefield involved. But I was also frightened that the child I am about to give birth to would die like my other children if I stayed on. So I fled the caliphate. Now all I want to do is come home to Britain.”
She and two of her fellow Bethnal Green academy pupils, Kadiza Sultana and Amira Abase, made headlines when they flew from Gatwick to Turkey in February 2015, then entered Syria. Begum and Abase were both 15, while Sultana was 16. They had told their parents they were simply going out for the day.
The Guardian understands the Begum family believe the woman identified in the Syrian camp is Shamima.
-snip-
Shamima Begum, 19, in refugee camp in Syria after fleeing last territory held by Islamic State
Mattha Busby and Vikram Dodd
Thu 14 Feb 2019 00.42 GMT
An east London schoolgirl who left the UK in 2015 to join Islamic State has been tracked down in Syria where she said has no regrets about joining the group, but now wants to come home as she is nine months pregnant.
Shamima Begum, 19, said she fled the jihadists’ last remaining enclave in Baghuz, eastern Syria, as she was tired of life on a battlefield and feared for her unborn child after her two other children died.
“I was weak,” she told the Times from the al-Hawl refugee camp in north-eastern Syria. “I could not endure the suffering and hardship that staying on the battlefield involved. But I was also frightened that the child I am about to give birth to would die like my other children if I stayed on. So I fled the caliphate. Now all I want to do is come home to Britain.”
She and two of her fellow Bethnal Green academy pupils, Kadiza Sultana and Amira Abase, made headlines when they flew from Gatwick to Turkey in February 2015, then entered Syria. Begum and Abase were both 15, while Sultana was 16. They had told their parents they were simply going out for the day.
The Guardian understands the Begum family believe the woman identified in the Syrian camp is Shamima.
-snip-
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/feb/14/london-schoolgirl-who-fled-to-join-isis-wants-to-return-to-uk
Shamima Begum left the UK in 2015 to join Isis in Syria Photograph: LONDON METROPLITAN POLICE / HANDOUT/EPA
