Shamima Begum’s citizenship should never have been taken away
The Supreme Court has today upheld the ban on Shamima Begum returning to this country to contest the Home Secretary’s decision to strip her of her citizenship. The judges ruled that her right to a fair hearing did not trump national security considerations. But Begum should never have been stripped of her citizenship in the first place. She was born in this country, grew up here and was educated here. This makes her British. To pretend otherwise is absurd. Stripping her of her citizenship allows us to ignore the fact that someone from this country – a liberal democracy with the rule of law – went to live in a self-proclaimed caliphate
