Seems the jihadi bride Shamima Begum might be coming back to stand trial in the U.K.

I can understand the arguments on both sides and worry that she could be a danger to Britain.

However I can't help but think of my own 15 year old GD. How can I not feel very sorry for the girl, she was both naive and idealistic? What she has seen and lived through is truly shocking.

Such a dilemma, but I fall on the side of bringing her home to answer for her past. She legally is British.

*Lemongrove said 'While I understand the feelings of everyone who doesn’t want her back here, there are a few things to consider.
1. She was a teenager when she and her friends left the UK with romantic notions of marrying ‘warriors’ and living as they thought Allah would want ( ...yes, I know!)
2. Other than being married and having babies there, we don’t know if she committed crimes or not ( totally unknowable).
3. Am uneasy really with making any person ‘stateless’
4. I think that every country including ours, has to take responsibility for their own citizens, take them back and imprison if necessary. It really isn’t fair to any country to make them responsible for foreign terrorists and their dependents'.

I agree wholeheartedly with the above, well put Lemon.

Of course we all have concerns but it is our responsibility to take care of our own.

LullyDully, I too think of my 14 year old GGD, who innocently discusses clothes, and her array of fairylights in her bedroom !
Not the thought of someone's severed head in a bucket or leaving to join an extremist group.

The seed is already planted in those whose thoughts turn to terrorism, and nobody can change them I don't care what anyone says.

An innocent/naive girl Shamima Begum wasn't !!

I believe that she should be brought back to the U.K. to face justice here for the following reasons.

A public trial would expose the sordid and squalid existence that she has led, and may act as a deterrent to others who harbour the delusion of romantic idealism.

It would show that our justice is superior to the brutal justice of ISIS.

I believe mercy to be a powerful weapon against terrorism.

I agree withlemongrove's post too.

Jack Letts has dual nationality - has Canada refused to take him? His parents were going to move there, I believe.

I didn’t suggest it was the school authorities behind this, but as I understand it, an older girl who had already gone to Syria was recruiting other girls within the school. The school warned the parents in a letter about radicalisation. Maybe they could have been more pro active.

I also agree with lemongrove
We can't duck out of our responsibilities here.
Greeneyedgirl has also made some very valid points.

She was 15 when she left the UK. She was born in this country and is a British citizen. Although she is of Bangladeshi heritage, she has never lived in Bangladesh and would have now means of support. Anyway, it appears that Bangladesh, quite understandably, does not wish to take her in.

Some say she is truly wicked and manipulative and deserves to be stripped of her citizenship and doomed to be an outcast in the world. Others think she was a naive and impressionable girl who may well not have understood the true nature of the regime to which she was fleeing.

I subscribe to the latter point of view and believe she may still be still naive, and emotionally and intellectually immature. Anyone who was truly crafty and manipulative would have appeared on TV weeping and wailing and saying what a terrible crime she had committed, how much she had come to realise that she loved Britain, etc, etc. Instead, she came across in a fairly blank way - and emotional detachment can be an indicator of trauma. She neither apologised for her actions nor displayed the sort of emotions that may have invited sympathy.

Whatever you think, as others have said, why on earth should another country be expected to take her in, and presumably support her?

Ms Begum turned her back on the country which gave her an education and a promising future. No way should she be allowed back to fight her stateless case. She rejected Britain. that was her choice. Don't try to come crawling back because you don't like living in a camp.

These girls probably were artful and devious, but lets face it they didn't have to try very hard to outwit the authorities and their parentswho seemed half asleep or completely naive!
I honestly don't think you can judge her on her show of, or lack of, remorse. We don't know who was lurking in the shadows while she was being interviewed, has she been brainwashed, terrorised, her babies murdered perhaps? Or is she as she appeared, a cold hearted cruel vicious killer? All we do know is that she is not the young girl that went willing on this great adventure! Is her present persona her way of coping with the horrors she's witnessed? like people turning to drink or drugs to block out the past? We just don't know!
Imo she needs to come back and be dealt with appropriately sooner than being left where she is to probably join a terrorist group. Full of bitterness and hatred she could do a lot of harm, cause more death and destruction, and die a hideous death.

EllanVannin

LullyDully, I too think of my 14 year old GGD, who innocently discusses clothes, and her array of fairylights in her bedroom !
Not the thought of someone's severed head in a bucket or leaving to join an extremist group.

The seed is already planted in those whose thoughts turn to terrorism, and nobody can change them I don't care what anyone says.

An innocent/naive girl Shamima Begum wasn't !!

She would have been an innocent girl at some point in her life, just like your GGD is now.

A 15 year old not grateful for the education she was given . Do you really think this is rare? I wasnt aware gratitude and teenage years went together!!

She is only one of thousands who may want to return to their home countries, including many Britons.

Should she be treated as a special case because of her age or will her case set a precedent?

I would take notice of those in counter-terrorism. They believe it would be dangerous for UK citizens if Begum is allowed to return.

I am sorry for the 15 year old girl who left, but 5 years later she is a woman, who has been radicalised. Can we take the chance that she may be wanting to come back to join other terrorists.

I would be worried for my family and friends if she and others are allowed to come back to the UK.

She left presumably of her own free will and now she’s to like it. Tough. No way should she be allowed back.

I don't see how several posters can blame the school she attended for not picking up on what these girls were up to. In one of the poorest London boroughs, teachers at that school would have enough to deal with in the classroom without delving into the kids' backgrounds and inclinations.
That area of East London has always experienced tensions, and no doubtBangladeshipupils at the school experienced racist attacks. It's gangsterland too. I doubt whether the school was half asleep as suggested.

It makes me so cross to think that her parents were permitted to settle here, to benefit from our NHS and free education, plus everything else this country has to offer, and yet one of their offspring rejected all the opportunities here to make a good life for herself and instead decided to join one of the most vile terrorist organisations in the world.

I am sure there will be a massive amount of opposition to the plan to let her return.

Can the judge’s decision be overruled?

I agree with lemon and kittylester. She hadn't even taken her GCSEs when she left. She was a CHILD, a groomed and immature child. Vulnerable. She was and should still be a British citizen and should be brought back and hopefully re-habilitated and debriefed. She has been through terrible traumas as a result of being where she was, through being groomed and brainwashed. How on earth she'd have time to be a danger to anyone while being pregnant and giving birth multiple times is beyond me - not to mention her babies' being ill and dying. She's endured enough.

If any of this report is true, then Shamima Begum is a lonnnnnggg way from being a naive young girl who didnt know whatnshed got herself involved with:

Begum served in ISIL's "morality police", and also tried to recruit other young women to join the jihadist group.[17] She was allowed to carry a Kalashnikov rifle and earned a reputation as a strict enforcer of ISIL's laws, such as dress codes for women. Additionally, an anti-ISIL activist told The Independent that there are separate allegations of "Begum [stitching] suicide bombers into explosive vests so they could not be removed without detonating".

Nevertheless, she's our problem.

She also comes under the UN defnition of a child soldier
Definition of a child soldier
^A child associated with an armed force or armed group refers to any person below 18 years of age who is, or who has been, recruited or used by an armed force or armed group in any capacity, including but not limited to children, boys and girls, used as fighters, cooks, porters, spies or for sexual purposes.
(Source: Paris Principles on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict 2007)^
One of the acknowledged consequences of this involvement is that the young person does not display the usual emotions and may seem insensitive to atrocities.

Eloethan said "she came across in a fairly blank way - and emotional detachment can be an indicator of trauma. She neither apologised for her actions nor displayed the sort of emotions that may have invited sympathy"

Also symptoms of a psychopath: pathological lying, cunning, manipulative, lack of remorse or guilt, shallow emotional range, callous and lack of empathy.

I also agree with lemon and kitty
She was fifteen, fifteen when she left Britain
She was a British citizen and should have been dealt with accordingly. Javid should not have taken her citizenship away
As soon as she was located in the refugee camp, she should have been repatriated, along with her baby. The authorities should have taken charge of Shamima and who knows, her baby may have lived with our medical care
But no, they were just left there, for the baby to die. How does an innocent child deserve that?
It should shame all of us

My GGD is taught differently Dinahmo , such as being taught to love and not kill. Most importantly she's not influenced nor brainwashed in any way. This is the difference.

Would you turn a hair if you looked at a severed human head in a bucket ? Because Shamima didn't. A killer wouldn't.

Amazing how the empathy and care shown to young women, girls, who were 'groomed' by men - changes depending on the colour of their skin. The hypocrisy is massive.

Amazing how the empathy and care shown to young women, girls, who were 'groomed' by men - changes depending on the colour of their skin. The hypocrisy is massive.