CEDH · CASELAW;COMMUNICATEDCASES;ENG — 25 novembre 2025

.s800EAC49 { font-size:12pt } .s379BC09C { margin-top:36pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:right } .sBB9EE52A { font-family:Arial } .s2EB42ED2 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; font-size:10pt } .s5E1364CA { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-size:14pt } .s339D85E6 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:14pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid } .s665E407E { margin-top:66pt; margin-bottom:14pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid } .s29100277 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold } .s10950C61 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-indent:14.2pt; text-align:justify } .s32563E28 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt } .s25D5DE94 { margin-top:66pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-size:7pt } .s1DE04B9 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-size:7pt } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } Published on 15 December 2025   SECOND SECTION Application no. 36427/24 Shamima BEGUM against the United Kingdom lodged on 5 December 2024 communicated on 25 November 2025 SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE The application concerns the decision of the Secretary of State for the Home Department of 19 February 2019, taken under section 40(2) of the British Nationality Act 1981, to deprive the applicant of her British citizenship after she left the United Kingdom in 2015, then aged fifteen, to travel to Syria to align herself with the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. Deprivation of citizenship was deemed to be conducive to the public good as the applicant was assessed as posing a threat to the national security of the United Kingdom. The applicant complains under Article 4 of the Convention that the Secretary of State, in deciding to deprive her of her citizenship, did not consider (a) whether she might have been a victim of trafficking and whether that led to the acts for which the State was considering depriving her of her citizenship; (b) whether there had been any potential failures by the State to take reasonable steps to protect her from being trafficked, in breach of the protective duty and, if so, whether restitutionary obligations might be owed; (c) whether depriving her of her citizenship would frustrate or prevent the discharge of the Article 4 investigative and operational duties, or the restitutionary obligations arising from a prior breach of the protective duty; and (d) whether in all the circumstances of case, deprivation could nevertheless be justified on national security grounds.       QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES 1.     For the purposes of the Article 4 complaints made in the application, was the applicant at all material times within the jurisdiction of the United Kingdom, within the meaning of Article 1 of the Convention?   2.     Having regard to the facts of the case at hand, has there been a violation of the applicant’s rights under Article 4 of the Convention by virtue of the decision to deprive her of her citizenship?   3.     Did the Secretary of State for the Home Department’s decision to deprive the applicant of her citizenship engage her rights under Article 4 of the Convention? Did the Secretary of State have a positive obligation, by virtue of Article 4 of the Convention, to consider whether the applicant had been a victim of trafficking, and whether any duties or obligations to her flowed from that fact, before deciding to deprive her of her citizenship?   4.     Was the deprivation of citizenship analogous to a criminal prosecution? Was it a “penalty” within the meaning of Article 26 of The Council of Europe Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings, 2005 (see, for example, V.C.L. and A.N. v.   the United Kingdom , nos. 77587/12 and   74603/12, 16 February 2021)?