Courts, Civil Law, Criminal Law and Superannuation (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2024: [Seanad Bill amended by the Dáil] Report and Final Stages
Seanad Éireann — 2024-07-17
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Tom Clonan (IND), University of Dublin

I am talking about the procedures as set out. I am not comparing Dublin to Guantanamo Bay. For a start, the weather does not compare. However, the concept does. It creates a two-tier citizenship where naturalised citizens have diminished rights as compared with those of citizens by birth.
I will give another example. Shamima Begum, a 15-year-old girl from Bethnal Green in London, and a couple of her school friends went to Syria in 2015 as children. When they got there, she was married to a Belgian jihadist and then serially raped for three years. On the collapse of that caliphate, the British Government decided to revoke and strip her of her citizenship, claiming that she had Bangladeshi citizenship to avoid the accusation of rendering her stateless. Bangladesh had denied that she is a Bangladeshi citizen and she is now effectively stateless in a refugee camp in northern Syria. She has had threats against her life. I am not condoning her actions but her actions were carried out as a child, she was raped and she has been further victimised and placed at risk by being stateless as a result of an act of the British Government. However, somebody like Lisa Smith, a member of Óglaigh na hÉireann who swore an oath of allegiance to uphold the Constitution, travelled to Syria as an adult and knowingly participated in Islamic State's activities and lived in the-----

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2024-07-17/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:53:13+00:00
Sitting date: 2024-07-17