British woman who joined Isis in Syria guilty of encouraging terror acts

A British woman who travelled to Syria with her young child has been convicted of being a member of Islamic State and encouraging acts of terror on social media.

Tareena Shakil, 26, was radicalised on the internet and travelled to Syria via Turkey after telling friends and family she was off on a beach holiday. She spent more than two months living in a mansion with women of various nationalities waiting to be matched up with men and, while there, sent messages and pictures glorifying Isis including ones of her posing with an AK-47 assault rifle.

From the witness box at Birmingham crown court, Shakil gave an extraordinary account of her time in Raqqa, the de facto capital of Isis, and described how she managed to escape after becoming disillusioned and frightened.

Shakil, from Birmingham, claimed she had been groomed by Isis recruiters, who targeted her when she was low because of the break-up of her marriage in the UK. She insisted her every move was monitored by Isis minders and she had no choice but to send messages and pictures that were supportive of Isis.

The trial was told that Shakil was one of about 60 British women who are believed to have left to join Isis in Syria. They were said to have been among about 600 women from Europe, North America and Australia in Syria.

After the jury returned its verdict, West Midlands police said they believed she presented a real threat to the UK.

Assistant chief constable Marcus Beale, who leads on counter-terrorism, said: “Tareena Shakil had self-radicalised by viewing extremist material on the internet, before leaving the UK in October 2014. Our assessment is that she was not naive; she had absolutely clear intentions when she left the UK, sending tweets encouraging the public to commit acts of terrorism here and then taking her young child to join Daesh [Isis] in Syria. Photographs seized from her phone showed Ms Shakil posing with a firearm and wearing a Daesh balaclava. Another showed a rucksack with a Daesh logo and person holding a handgun. These were taken while she was in Syria.