Shamima Begum says she was the victim of online grooming for months before she decided to leave Britain in 2015 and go to Syria to marry an ISIS fighter.
Begum, from east London, said: “I let my family down”, but said she was hopeful of reconciling with them.
In February 2015, Begum, then 15, left England with two friends for the promise of paradise in the so-called caliphate. She was married to a Dutch extremist 10 days after she arrived in Syria.
They had three children, none of whom survived.
The British government stripped Begum of her passport and said she would pose a national security threat if allowed to return.
The 22-year-old, who said that her only crime was travelling to Syria, is calling on Britain's home secretary to reinstate her citizenship.
Speaking to Sky News from the Al Roj camp in northern Syria, where she lives with other women and children linked to ISIS, Begum repeated her denial of accusations that she was responsible for atrocities under the terrorist regime, saying they were “all completely false”.
“I’m willing to fight them in a court of law, but I’m not being given a chance,” she said.
“I feel like the only crime I committed was coming here, so I would be willing to go to prison for that, but as for the accusations made against me, I’m just going to have to fight against them."
Looking back on her journey to the ISIS caliphate, Begum said she was promised “paradise, basically, but it was actually hell on earth”.
She claimed said she was a victim of online grooming, but she did not say who was responsible.
Asked if she went looking for ISIS propaganda on the internet, she said: “No, they kind of just find you online.
“I would not have made such a big decision like that if it were not for weeks and weeks and maybe months and months of, like, grooming,” she said.
She said: “I didn’t hate Britain. I hated my life really.”
Begum said she is not in contact with her family in the UK but is hopeful the ties can be mended one day.
"I don't think they failed me, in a way I failed them. When the time is right, I want to reconcile,” she said.
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Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Our legal consultant
Name: Dr Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
Key changes
Commission caps
For life insurance products with a savings component, Peter Hodgins of Clyde & Co said different caps apply to the saving and protection elements:
• For the saving component, a cap of 4.5 per cent of the annualised premium per year (which may not exceed 90 per cent of the annualised premium over the policy term).
• On the protection component, there is a cap of 10 per cent of the annualised premium per year (which may not exceed 160 per cent of the annualised premium over the policy term).
• Indemnity commission, the amount of commission that can be advanced to a product salesperson, can be 50 per cent of the annualised premium for the first year or 50 per cent of the total commissions on the policy calculated.
• The remaining commission after deduction of the indemnity commission is paid equally over the premium payment term.
• For pure protection products, which only offer a life insurance component, the maximum commission will be 10 per cent of the annualised premium multiplied by the length of the policy in years.
Disclosure
Customers must now be provided with a full illustration of the product they are buying to ensure they understand the potential returns on savings products as well as the effects of any charges. There is also a “free-look” period of 30 days, where insurers must provide a full refund if the buyer wishes to cancel the policy.
“The illustration should provide for at least two scenarios to illustrate the performance of the product,” said Mr Hodgins. “All illustrations are required to be signed by the customer.”
Another illustration must outline surrender charges to ensure they understand the costs of exiting a fixed-term product early.
Illustrations must also be kept updatedand insurers must provide information on the top five investment funds available annually, including at least five years' performance data.
“This may be segregated based on the risk appetite of the customer (in which case, the top five funds for each segment must be provided),” said Mr Hodgins.
Product providers must also disclose the ratio of protection benefit to savings benefits. If a protection benefit ratio is less than 10 per cent "the product must carry a warning stating that it has limited or no protection benefit" Mr Hodgins added.
COMPANY%20PROFILE%20
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COMPANY%20PROFILE
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Ipaf in numbers
Established: 2008
Prize money: $50,000 (Dh183,650) for winners and $10,000 for those on the shortlist.
Winning novels: 13
Shortlisted novels: 66
Longlisted novels: 111
Total number of novels submitted: 1,780
Novels translated internationally: 66
The Sand Castle
Director: Matty Brown
Stars: Nadine Labaki, Ziad Bakri, Zain Al Rafeea, Riman Al Rafeea
Rating: 2.5/5
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Sholto Byrnes on Myanmar politics
The National Archives, Abu Dhabi
Founded over 50 years ago, the National Archives collects valuable historical material relating to the UAE, and is the oldest and richest archive relating to the Arabian Gulf.
Much of the material can be viewed on line at the Arabian Gulf Digital Archive - https://www.agda.ae/en
