Jihadi brides such as Shamima Begum could be just as dangerous as male foreign fighters if ever allowed back into the country, a former Scotland Yard counter-terrorism chief warned today.
Richard Walton, who led the Met’s counter-terrorism command for five years until 2016, said it would be a mistake to make “simplistic” judgements based on the gender of a potential returnee in assessing the threat they pose.
He added that some British women who had travelled to Syria had played a “vital” role in plotting Islamic State attacks and that the radicalising effect that they might have on future generations of Britons should not be under-estimated.
“Women who joined Isis as ‘jihadi brides’, far from being passive actors or victims, are likely to have been participants in terrorist activities in Syria,” he said. “Many will pose just as much of a security threat as their male counterparts.”
Mr Walton’s comments, in an editorial for The Times newspaper, came as Ms Begum appealed in her latest media interview to be given “a second chance” in Britain.
The 19-year-old former Bethnal Green schoolgirl, who was last week stripped of her British citizenship by Home Secretary Sajid Javid, said she wanted to come back so that she could teach others not to repeat her error.
“I am hoping to be given a second chance” she told the Daily Mail.
“I’d like to be an example of how someone can change. I want to help, encourage other young British people to think before they make life- changing decisions like this and not to make the same mistake as me.”
Ms Begum’s remarks are the latest in a series of media interviews that she has given since she was found living in a Syrian refugee camp only days before giving birth to her third child.
The first two died but Ms Begum hopes to win a legal battle with the Home Secretary over her citizenship so that she can return to Britain to raise her new son.
Legal proceedings are likely to take as long as two years, however, meaning that Ms Begum seems likely to stay stranded in Syria for many more months.
