In honor of International Women in Diplomacy Day, the Kurdish Peace Institute in Washington DC held a panel with Kurdish representatives from Syria, Iraq, and Turkey. The panel included Ceylan Akca, a parliamentarian from Turkey, Treefa Aziz, the Representative of the Kurdistan Regional Government in Iraq, and the Syrian Democratic Council’s Sinam Sherkany Mohamad.

They spoke on the connected and yet distinct histories and challenges faced by Kurdish women in diplomacy across the region. As women from a people that have been divided between neighboring states, they face the double challenge of struggling for women’s rights within a larger struggle for greater Kurdish autonomy. 

As such, they have often been forced to conduct their diplomacy outside of conventional channels, or taken creative approaches to have an influence on peace building. The panelists agreed that in all three regions, women’s role in recent decades defending society from terrorism, particularly on the battlefield, has softened negative attitudes towards women’s participation in other areas of society, such as diplomacy. 

Mohamad stressed that from her personal experience in Europe and the United States, this is as true inside the Middle East, as it is outside. Biased attitudes towards women in leadership and diplomacy are an uphill battle around the world, which is widely recognized at an international level. 

According to the Council on Foreign Relations, from 1992-2019, women made up only 13 percent of negotiators and six percent of signatories in major peace processes globally.  Recognizing the cost to leaving women out of peacebuilding and diplomacy, in 2000 the UN passed UNSCR 1325 which set a global Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda for this century.  

Kurdish women are leading the way on the implementation of 1325 in the Middle East, and setting standards for the rest of the world. The Kurdistan Regional Government has created an official WPS national action plan for their region, while women’s participation in north and east Syria has far surpassed the thresholds identified by the UN resolution. 

Kurds across the diaspora face a myriad of different issues, and respond to them in different ways, arising from their distinct geopolitical situations. This panel, however, provides a proof point that the common issues women face across the diaspora can be a convener for inter-Kurdish dialogue. This is equally true for inter-ethnic dialogue. As Ceylan Akca mentioned in her talk, groups of mothers of Kurdish militants have managed to open lines of communication with mothers of Turkish soldiers. In north and east Syria, the women’s movement has become a fulcrum for cooperation as Arab, Syriac and Kurdish women work together to lift each other up.