Leyla İmret

Leyla İmret is a Turkish politician of Kurdish origin. She grew up in Germany but returned to her home country in 2013 and was elected mayor of Cizre on 31 March 2014. She was dismissed from her position by the government on 11 September 2015 after the siege of Cizre during the Kurdish-Turkish conflict. She eventually fled to Germany where she has continued to speak out against human rights abuses in the region. She is the subject of a 2017 documentary film, Dil Leyla and winner of the ILHR's 2018 Carl von Ossietzky Medal.