The east London schoolgirl who left the UK to join Islamic State has compared the Manchester Arena bombing to airstrikes by the western allies that killed non-combatants in Isis-held areas. Shamima Begum, 19, says she wants to return to Britain and is asking for “forgiveness”, having given birth to a son on Saturday while in a refugee camp in Syria.

A debate has broken out about whether Begum, who travelled to Syria in 2015 aged 15, should be allowed to return to Britain having joined Isis, which has claimed responsibility for terrorist attacks on the UK. The Manchester Arena attack in May 2017 killed 22 people after a suicide bomber detonated a device packed with shrapnel at the end of a pop concert.

In the latest of a series of interviews she has given while in the camp, Begum told the BBC she had regrets about the Manchester attack: “I do feel that is wrong. Innocent people did get killed,” she said. “It’s one thing to kill a soldier, it’s fine, it’s self-defence. But to kill people like women and children, just like the women and children in Baghuz who are being killed right now unjustly by the bombings. It’s a two-way thing really.”(theguardian)…[+]