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Baby of Islamic State Teenager in British Furor Dies


FILE - Renu Begum, eldest sister of missing sister of missing British girl Shamima Begum, holds a picture of her sister while being interviewed by the media in central London, Feb. 22, 2015.
FILE - Renu Begum, eldest sister of missing sister of missing British girl Shamima Begum, holds a picture of her sister while being interviewed by the media in central London, Feb. 22, 2015.

The infant son of Shamima Begum, a teenager who left London to join the Islamic State group in Syria, has died, a spokesman for the U.S. backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) said on Friday.

Begum, whose first two children also died, was stripped of her British citizenship last month on security grounds after she was discovered in a detention camp in Syria.

The 19-year-old left London to join IS when she was 15. She had sought to return to Europe with her third child, who was born about three weeks ago.

SDF spokesman Mustafa Bali said the child had died. Begum has said in media interviews her son was named Jarrah.

Begum married Yago Riedijk, a Dutch fighter for IS who surrendered to Syrian fighters and was being held in a Kurdish detention center in northeastern Syria.

A British government spokesman said: "The death of any child is tragic and deeply distressing for the family.

"The Foreign and Commonwealth Office has consistently advised against travel to Syria since April 2011. The government will continue to do whatever we can to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism and traveling to dangerous conflict zones."

The family's London-based lawyer on Friday said the baby's death had been confirmed, after saying earlier that there were strong but still unconfirmed reports of the infant's death.

The fate of Begum has illustrated the ethical, legal and security conundrum that governments face when dealing with the families of militants who swore to destroy the West.

The U.S-backed SDF is now trying to take Islamic State's last, small patch of ground in eastern Syria. They have slowed their offensive on the jihadist enclave at Baghouz near the Iraqi border to allow many thousands of people to pour out in an exodus that has lasted weeks.

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    Reuters

    Reuters is a news agency founded in 1851 and owned by the Thomson Reuters Corporation based in Toronto, Canada. One of the world's largest wire services, it provides financial news as well as international coverage in over 16 languages to more than 1000 newspapers and 750 broadcasters around the globe.

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