Shamima Begum's husband says he wants to return to the Netherlands and live a 'normal life' with ISIS bride

Islamic Sate fighter Yago Riedijk was found at a detention centre in Syria
BBC
Jacob Jarvis6 April 2019

ISIS bride Shamima Begum’s husband has said he wants to return to his home country and serve his prison sentence then have a “normal life” with his wife.

Yago Riedijk, 27, is in a Kurdish detention centre in Syria and would face six years in prison if he returned to the Netherlands.

He was convicted of joining a terror organisation in his absence in summer 2018.

“I wish to return home, spend the due time in jail, then go back to normal life with my wife, with no troubles, no wars, and no poverty, just to live,” he said in a new interview, MailOnline reports.

“For me, I recognised what wrong I did, and I knew ISIS reality. I feel regret, I want to go back to my normal life and improve myself, I would never go back to such error.”

Shamima Begum had her citizenship revoked
BBC

Riedijk was previously jailed by Isis for spying charges, according to reports, and is now in Kurdish detention after the US-backed forces reclaimed the terrorist group’s Syrian territories.

His comments come after he told Sky News in March that he had “not had any direct involvement in hurting or harming people” and his wife “is not a danger to anyone whatsoever”.

Shamima Begum was 15 when she left the UK
PA

The pair had three children together, all of which have died.

A baby boy named Jarrah was their last child together and passed away aged less than three weeks old.

In an interview with The Times, Riedijk, said the couple are living a “nightmare” after the death of their third child – a baby son who was born in a Syrian refugee camp in February. The baby was less than three weeks old when he died.

(L-R) Kadiza Sultana, 16, Shamima Begum, 15 and Amira Abase, 15 going through security at Gatwick airport at the time they first fled to Syria

The couple’s first two children, a girl and boy, died of malnutrition as infants.

He previously spoke of Begum being “devastated” over her losses and described the girl, who he married when she was 15 and he 23, as “easy” to love.

Begum, who had her British citizenship revoked after a fierce national row over her request to come back to the UK, is also still in Syria in a refugee camp.

The former Bethnal Green schoolgirl fled to join the Islamic State aged 15 and was one of three young women who fled the UK for Syria in 2015.

The 19-year-old recently spoke again of her desire to return and told the Times: "Since I left​ Baghouz I really regretted everything I did, and I feel like I want to go back to the UK for a second chance to start my life over again.

“I was brainwashed. I came here believing everything that I had been told, while knowing little about the truths of my religion.”

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