The eight-year-old son of a suspected Islamic State fighter received his Irish passport last week after a High Court challenge against the state’s refusal to recognise his citizenship.
Dublin-born Abdul Malik Bekmirzaev was deported from Turkey in January 2020 to Belarus, his mother’s home country, after the Irish government refused to reissue his passport. The boy, who was brought to Syria by his parents as an infant, was held in Kurdish detention camps with Lisa Smith, the Irish former soldier, before Turkish-backed militants stormed the region, transporting the wives and children of Isis members to Turkey.
Last September, the state informed the boy’s lawyers that it was not issuing him with a new passport and did not consider him a citizen because his father’s citizenship had been revoked. The boy challenged this in the High Court.
The boy’s father, Alexandr Bekmirzaev, was a naturalised Irish citizen and has been held by the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces in a prison for Isis fighters in eastern Syria.
The state revoked his 2010 naturalisation certificate last year, on the basis that he had obtained citizenship through a “sham marriage”. According to Kurdish sources, the Irish government has not contacted the alleged Isis fighter or informed him of the loss of his citizenship.
Advertisement
More than a dozen Irish children were brought to Syria by their parents between 2014 and 2015. While many are believed to have been killed by airstrikes, others are reported to be in Middle Eastern detention facilities for Isis family members. Wendy Lyon, a solicitor who represented the boy, said the case posed questions about Ireland’s willingness to accept responsibility for its citizens.
“This is an Irish citizen who was left stranded in Europe’s last dictatorship. While we’re happy his Irish citizenship has been recognised and a passport issued to him, Abdul Malik’s case presents us with a series of troubling questions. Why was this allowed to happen to an Irish citizen? And how many other children might be in the same situation because the government is not looking out for them?” she said.
In recent months, several European Isis members have died in Syrian prisons due to illness and injury. It is unclear if Alexandr Bekmirzaev, who has asked to be returned to Ireland, is still alive.
The elder Bekmirzaev was part of a group of well-known Irish jihadists that included Dubliner Khalid Kelly and a deported Jordanian recruiter.
The Department of Justice said it does not comment on specific cases. It noted the Supreme Court had ruled in a separate case in February that two provisions in the law setting out how naturalised Irish citizens can have their citizenship revoked were unconstitutional and should be replaced.