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THREAD — A British court has ruled that Shamima Begum must be repatriated to the UK to appeal the stripping of her citizenship
This decision will have implications for all Brits, 15-20 families, detained in Syria, who have also had their UK citizenship stripped /1
This decision will have implications for all Brits, 15-20 families, detained in Syria, who have also had their UK citizenship stripped /1
The ruling is an extraordinary rebuke to the gov’t & shows a court taking the moral & legal high ground, instead of playing race politics
Leaving Brits stranded in an region with no state, no real court system, was neither just to ISIS victims, fair to the SDF, nor lawful 2/
Leaving Brits stranded in an region with no state, no real court system, was neither just to ISIS victims, fair to the SDF, nor lawful 2/
The court’s conclusion that repatriation security risks can be “addressed and managed” is significant — the numbers of Brits are small, and the system here can cope 3/
Shamima’s story: a 15-year-old from Bethnal Green groomed and recruited by ISIS, trafficked for the militia’s exploitation and underage marriage, and failed by school/police safeguarding 4/
For details about how the authorities neglected to tell Shamima’s parents that her best friend had travelled to join ISIS, how they essentially let the East London girls walk out of Britain, see my book’s early chapters 5/
The government's handling of her case was always more about the racialised and febrile populism of Brexit-era Britain as about security
The media's predatory reporting on Shamima and subsequent trial-by-tabloids did not help 6/
The media's predatory reporting on Shamima and subsequent trial-by-tabloids did not help 6/
As @Reprieve @mayafoa notes "It was always unsafe and unjust to make Brits in Syria someone else’s problem, and today it has been ruled unlawful.” 7/ https://reprieve.org.uk/press/court-rules-shamima-begum-citizenship-stripping-unlawful/?utm_content=buffer71b6a&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer
https://reprieve.org.uk/press/court-rules-shamima-begum-citizenship-stripping-unlawful/?utm_content=buffer71b6a&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer
It is difficult to see how the government might successfully appeal -- the Supreme Court would have to make a wholly different decision about the feasibility of a court appeal from a black site in Syria 8/
For a thorough accounting of how Western governments should shift policy, take responsibility and repatriate their citizens from Syria, see our @CrisisGroup report 9/ https://www.crisisgroup.org/middle-east-north-africa/eastern-mediterranean/syria/208-women-and-children-first-repatriating-westerners-affiliated-isis
For the sake of the girl that Shamima Begum once was, before she was lured to ISIS, for the protection of the idea that she is British, was worth protecting then and deserving of justice now, I am hopeful for the first time in a long time. 10/END
