Shamima Begum’s return to Britain is put on HOLD as Government wins right to fight case in Supreme Court

SHAMIMA Begum's return to the UK has been put on hold after the UK Government won it's fight to take its case to the Supreme Court.

The Government asked for permission to appeal against a ruling that Shamima Begum should be allowed to return to the UK to challenge the deprivation of her British citizenship.

Ms Begum, now 20, was one of three east London schoolgirls who travelled to Syria to join the so-called Islamic State group (IS) in February 2015.

She lived under IS rule for more than three years before she was found, nine months pregnant, in a Syrian refugee camp in February last year.

Then-home secretary Sajid Javid revoked her British citizenship on national security grounds later that month.

At a remote hearing on Friday, the Government argued that the Court of Appeal wrongly concluded Ms Begum should be granted leave to enter the UK despite the fact that "she is assessed to pose a threat to UK national security".

Sir James Eadie QC, for the Home Office, told the court there were "significant national security concerns" about Ms Begum's potential return to the UK.

He said: "The exposure of the public to an increased risk of terrorism is not justifiable or appropriate in an individual case on fairness grounds save perhaps in the very rarest of cases … this was not such a rare case."

Sir James added: "The public will be less well protected if Ms Begum returns than it would be if she does not return."

Earlier this month, the Court of Appeal ruled that "the only way in which she can have a fair and effective appeal is to be permitted to come into the United Kingdom to pursue her appeal".

Ms Begum claims she married Dutch convert Yago Riedijk 10 days after arriving in IS territory, with all three of her school friends also reportedly marrying foreign IS fighters.

She told The Times last February that she left Raqqa in January 2017 with her husband but her children, a one-year-old girl and a three-month-old boy, had both since died.

Her third child died shortly after he was born.