Farzana and Imran Ameen and their five children are thought to be travelling to Syria or Iraq, having told relatives conflicting stories about their plans

A family of seven from Bradford who are thought to be travelling to Syria or Iraq bought one-way tickets to Turkey and told relatives conflicting stories about their plans.



West Yorkshire police have launched an appeal to trace Farzana Ameen, 40, her husband, Imran, 40, and their five children, Isma Imran, 15, Moeen Imran, 14, Mohammed Muneeb Imran, 11, Ismail Imran, eight, and Mohammed Imran, five.

The police said Imran’s brother Rehan Noor-ul-Ameen, 30, who has not been seen by relatives for months, travelled from Manchester airport to Dalaman, Turkey, on 29 June, and is believed have continued on to Syria.

Police suspicion was increased as families have been told different stories by the married couple about their whereabouts, ranging from job offers in Dubai or Sharjah, in the United Arab Emirates, to holidays in the Middle East.



Farzana Ameen recently travelled to Pakistan with her mother, who has health issues, to leave her in the care of relatives. She is said to have told family members she is doing what is “best for the kids”, without revealing her location.

At the family’s semi-detached house, no one answered the door, and there was no reply either from next door, the home of Imran’s barrister father, Noor ul-Ameen.

Neighbour Israr Malik, 70, who said he known both parents since they were children, said he had been suspicious when he was told that Imran Ameen had a job in the UAE. “He is not an educated man, you have to be a real specialist to get a job there,” he said. “It sounded suspicious, yes. But I was shocked, he’s gone there to do what? Kill people? What will the children do there?” Malik said small things had changed recently: Farzana Ameen had sold her Jeep and bought a smaller vehicle, and Imran had been making most frequent visits to his local madrasa, Noor ul-Qur’an. Two months ago, Malik said, he had written to the local council raising concerns and asking them to investigate the madrasa. In the barbershop on the corner of the street where the family lived, several friends and relatives were discussing the disappearance. Mohammed Rafique, a great uncle to both Farzana and Imran, who are first cousins, said he believed they had gone to Dubai for work. “I was concerned when I hear about that, taking the children out of school can be very upsetting for them, and now people are saying they have gone to Syria. I can’t believe it. Everyone is very upset, father and mother are so worried.” Most neighbours described the family as quiet, but younger brother Rehan found himself in trouble with a gang in 2007 who kidnapped him, beat him with bats and tried to extort £20,000. “Rehan changed after that,” one neighbour who did not want to be named told the Guardian.

“He became more religious after having been very westernised before. Imran started becoming more religious too, he grew a beard and changed his clothes in the last few years.”

Assistant chief constable Russ Foster said the family travelled from Manchester airport to Antalya on 6 October and were reported missing on Tuesday.

“We’ve established they travelled to Turkey on a one-way ticket and though this is being treated as a missing from home inquiry we are keeping an open mind and the possibility the family may have travelled to Syria or Iraq,” he said.

Asked about Farzana Ameen’s missing brother, he said: “Clearly that’s a concern for us and another line of inquiry. His whereabouts and reasons for travel are currently unknown.” Detectives are working with UK-based relatives of the family, as well as with Turkish authorities.

Arshid Siddique, a relative who lives in the same street as the Ameens in Bradford, said Farzana Ameen had contacted her brother in Pakistan on Tuesday.



“She has spoken to him,” he said. “She sent him messages, and apparently the last message was: whatever she’s doing, she’s doing for the best for the kids.”

Siddique told the Guardian he was initially under the impression that the family had left for Sharjah. He said: “But when you don’t hear anything at all for a while, the rest of the family hadn’t heard anything, doubts start coming into your mind, and as soon as I saw police here, I knew.

“She never talked about it at all. Her mother had a stroke and she was bedridden, she couldn’t even talk. Let’s face it, there is no better medical care than here. Why would anyone want to leave? She was born here, her kids were born here.

“Anything going on in Syria was never discussed with me, never. I cannot understand it. I’m trying to think what was going through her head but as a parent, I can’t think of it.”

The appeal comes less than four months after police asked for the public’s help to track down three sisters and their nine children who left for Syria. Khadija Dawood, 30, her sisters Sugra, 34, and Zohra, 33, and their children, aged between three and 15, went missing after travelling to Turkey via Saudi Arabia on pilgrimage. The two cases are not connected.

Police and security services believe that at least 700 potential extremists have travelled from the UK to Syria, and around half are thought to have returned home.

Many of those travelling from the UK to Syria go to territories under the control of Islamic State, who have seized large swaths of the war-torn country and its neighbour Iraq.

The Met police assistant commissioner Mark Rowley, Britain’s most senior counter-terrorism officer, has said suspects are being arrested at a rate of more than one a day. He said at least 32 children in London had been made the subject of family court orders this year over fears of radicalisation, including some described by the assistant commissioner as “almost babes in arms”.

In the first official count of women and girls from the UK thought to have gone to Syria, police said in July that 43 were believed to have done so in the past year.

Imran Hussein, the MP for Bradford East, said he had made representations to officials in the Home Office and Foreign Office to try to track down his constituents. He said he had been assured by police that they were still treating it as a missing persons case rather than a counter-terrorism investigation.

“I was given assurances that West Yorkshire police were working with their counterparts in Turkey and this morning I was making representations to the Home Office and Foreign Office to locate the family and ensure their safe return.”



Ishtiaq Ahmed, of the Bradford Council of Mosques, urged fellow Muslims to come forward with any information about the whereabouts of the family. He said their disappearance was a “shock and of great concern to everyone in the community”.



He added: “Our main concern is for the children. I think it’s important that we find the family and establish the type of situation the family is in, then establish the welfare of the children.”