Shamima Begum lost UK citizenship last year for joining the terrorist group DHAKA: The father of a young British woman who has been stripped of her citizenship because she joined Daesh said he feared for her life. Ahmed Ali was speaking after his daughter, Shamima Begum, lost the initial stage of her appeal against the UK Home Office’s decision to revoke her citizenship. Begum was born in the UK and grew up in London. Her parents have Bangladeshi heritage, but a UK court recently heard that there was no evidence she had ever visited the country or applied for citizenship there. She is currently living in a Syrian refugee camp. Bangladesh has made it clear it wants nothing to do with her, and it also has a zero-tolerance policy on terrorists, meting out executions. “Bangladesh will not be a safe place for her,” Ali told Arab News from his village in Sylhet, around 250 kilometers from the capital Dhaka. “Even if she lands here accidentally, she will be hanged. Considering the current scenario, I think Shamima will live a better life where she is now, even though it’s a battlefield.” Begum was a schoolgirl when she traveled to Syria in 2015 and was accompanied by two other teenagers, Kadiza Sultana and Amira Abase. She was heavily pregnant when she was found in a Syrian camp last year by a British journalist who interviewed her, with the young woman saying she regretted her decision to join Daesh and appealing to the UK government to take her back. Sajid Javid, who was UK home secretary at the time, revoked her citizenship and urged the government to send her to Bangladesh. But Bangladesh has insisted there is no place for Begum and has even warned that the young woman could be executed for her involvement with Daesh. Foreign Minister Dr. A. K. Abdul Momen told reporters on Saturday: “Shamima Begum left Britain as a schoolgirl to join Islamic State (Daesh) in Syria and got her British citizenship revoked. She is neither a Bangladeshi citizen nor a dual citizen of the two countries. Her father was once a Bangladeshi and then took British citizenship. But they never applied for dual nationality with Bangladesh.” The country’s laws were very clear, the foreign minister said last May. “Terrorists will have to face the death penalty.” Momen’s tough statements have worried Ali, who said neither he nor his wife Asma have received any calls from their daughter since she ran away from home. One international law expert described the UK’s decision as an “unfair practice.” “Begum’s country of origin is the UK and she left from there,” Prof. M. Shahiduzzaman, from Dhaka University, told Arab News. “Whatever it is, good or bad, they have to accept her.” Begum should be put on trial and a court should decide if she was guilty or not, he added, but stripping her of citizenship was a “gross violation” of human rights. “It’s contrary to the British government’s stance regarding their worldwide role in the field of human rights.” He said the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees could take responsibility for Begum and initiate a permanent residency for her in a third country from among UN member states.