Mark Taylor, known as the 'Kiwi Jihadi', feels genuinely surprised he wasn't able to voice his freedom of speech while living under the Islamic State (IS).

Taylor spent around five years with the extremist group in Syria, despite the New Zealand Government warning citizens not to go there. He recently surrendered to local forces and was jailed in a Kurdish prison.

Speaking from prison to The National, a United Arab Emirates newspaper, Taylor opened up about his disappointment with the New Zealand Government, and admitted that life under IS wasn't what he thought it would be.

"I asked the Government to help me. But then eventually, they just stabbed me in the back," he told the newspaper.

He reflected on his time living with IS, including in 2015 when he inadvertently revealed the group's location by geotagging his social media posts, revealing he was in a house in the Syrian town of Al Taqbah.

The blunder earned Taylor the nickname "bumbling jihadi" by the media, and resulted in him spending 50 days in an IS prison.

"I was on holiday. I wanted to voice my freedom of speech," he told The National when asked about the incriminating social media posts.