In brief
- Shamima Begum is a British Bangladeshi girl who made international headlines after travelling to Syria to join IS in February 2015.
- "People in this cohort need to know that if they have committed a crime and if they return to Australia they will be met with the full force of the law," the government said.
When Shamima Begum left the UK to join ISIS in 2015, the British government stripped her passport, halting her return and rendering her stateless.
Since the collapse of the self-proclaimed Islamic State (IS) group's caliphate in Syria in 2019, she has been trapped in legal limbo. She currently resides in the same Syrian refugee camp holding the 34 Australians the government has said they won't help to return, sometimes referred to as 'ISIS Brides'.
There have been calls made to strip that group, made up of 11 women and 23 children, of their passports, leaving them to a fate that could be similar to that of Begum's.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has said he has "nothing but contempt" for the group who travelled to IS-controlled Syria before its defeat and that his government will not actively repatriate them. However, international law makes the revocation of passports legally dubious.
Here's what Begum's story could tell us about the future of the Australians trying to return from Syria.
Who is Shamima Begum?
Born in London, raised and educated in the multi-cultural neighbourhood of Bethnal Green, Shamima Begum is a British Bangladeshi girl who made international headlines after travelling to Syria to join IS in February 2015.
The girl, who was just 15 years old at the time, flew from London to Türkiye with her two school friends, Amira Abase and Kadiza Sultana, and was smuggled across the Syrian border with an IS-linked network. Just 10 days after their arrival, Begum was married to Dutch-born Yago Riedijk, a Muslim convert and IS fighter.
At the time, the self-proclaimed caliphate was at the height of its powers and occupied a territory roughly the size of Victoria with some 12 million people under its control.
Reports differ over what Begum did there, with some claiming she joined the brutal "morality police" and enforced strict discipline amongst the population. A fellow school friend, however, who joined IS before Begum, described her as a "shy misfit" who stayed at home under the command of her husband.
During her time in Syria, Begum gave birth to three children, all of whom died. Her youngest child, Jarrah, was born in the al-Hol refugee camp and died of pneumonia in al-Roj.
Jarrah's birth was what motivated her to seek a return to the UK, she claimed in a tell-all interview from al-Hol in 2019. The story sparked national debate over whether she should be allowed to come back and, the following day, then-British home secretary Sajid Javid stripped Begum of her passport.
"If you have supported terrorist organisations abroad I will not hesitate to prevent your return", Javid said.
Since then, Begum has spent the past seven years in al-Roj. In a BBC podcast she was the focus of in 2023, she mentioned living in a dusty tent, unable to leave, with an "indefinitely" similar future ahead of her.
"This is, I feel like worse than a prison sentence because at least with prison sentences you know that there will be an end, but here you don't know if there's going to be an end."
Australia's returning IS families
The Kurdish-controlled al-Roj camp houses roughly 2,500 women and children with links to IS who were sent there after the caliphate collapsed — men and boys were sent to prisons as Syrian and Kurdish forces reclaimed territory.
Their existence has long been a source of contention for governments around the world, many of whom don't want them to return. Australia is no different in that regard.
"My mother would have said: 'If you make your bed, you lie in it'," Albanese told ABC News.
"These people went overseas supporting Islamic State and went there to provide support for people who basically want a caliphate."
In September, a separate group of six women and children made their way back from Syria to Australia, prompting national outcry over their ability to enter the country and their right to a passport.
This is where the case of Begum potentially differs from the case of the Australians in al-Roj.
The British Home Office said in 2019 they believed Begum could claim Bangladeshi citizenship by descent. The government of Bangladesh, however, rejected such a claim.
"Bangladesh asserts that Ms Shamima Begum is not a Bangladeshi citizen. She is a British citizen by birth and has never applied for dual nationality with Bangladesh," Bangladesh's foreign ministry said in a statement.
"It may also be mentioned that she never visited Bangladesh in the past despite her parental lineage. So, there is no question of her being allowed to enter into Bangladesh," it added.
In addition, Bangladeshi foreign minister Abdul Momen reiterated in 2019 that Begum would face the death penalty if she entered the country, owing to its "zero tolerance" policy toward terrorism.
While Australia does have the power to remove passports in specific circumstances, particularly regarding security, they can't do so if that would then make a person stateless.
Instead, the government can issue Temporary Exclusion Orders under Australia's Counter-Terrorism Act, which does prevent an Australian citizen from returning for a fixed period of time, unless they fulfil certain conditions.
One such order has been issued against one member of the group, but the rest are legally allowed to return to Australia, although they may face significant legal issues if they do.
"People in this cohort need to know that if they have committed a crime and if they return to Australia they will be met with the full force of the law," the government said in a statement.
While the group did attempt to make the journey back to Australia earlier in the month, they were returned to the camp citing "technical" issues.
A Syrian official described the problem as "purely a procedural issue" that they expected to be fixed the same day.
SBS Dateline travelled to Syria in February 2024 to meet some of the Australians held in al-Roj, reporting the Kurdish authorities want Australian government permission to let them leave the camp.
In September last year, US Admiral Brad Cooper made a plea to the UN to return their citizens stuck in Syria.
"Repatriating vulnerable populations before they are radicalised is not just compassion — it is a decisive blow against ISIS's ability to regenerate."
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