Kurdish woman becomes youngest person to win seat in Icelandic parliament

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Lenya Rún Taha Karim, a 21-year-old law student, became the youngest candidates to win a parliament seat in the nation-wide elections that were held in Iceland on Saturday.

Karim was third on the libertarian Pirate Party’s list for the Reykjavík North district.

Það var svo sannarlega önnur reynsla að vakna við símtöl, skilaboð og fréttir um að ég hefði verið að slá met sem yngsti þingmaður í sögu Íslands. Fyrsti Kúrdinn líka. Takk fyrir traustið öll sem kusu Pírata 💜

— Lenya Rún (@Lenyarun) September 26, 2021

On Twitter, she wrote she woke up to news that she broke a record as the youngest MP in the history of Iceland. She was also the first Kurdish MP in the country’s history.

“Thank you to everyone who voted for the Pirate Party,” she tweeted.

Before the elections, Valur Grettisson, editor-in-chief at Reykjavík Grapevine, wrote that there was a “fairly good chance that a candidate of Kurdish descent could be elected to the Icelandic parliament for the first time.”

She told the Reykjavík Grapevine in an interview that there is a lack of immigrant representation in the Icelandic parliament.

“I didn‘t have any role models when I started out in politics, nor did I grow up with any representation,” she said. “The lack of representation and role models could lead to other immigrants being hesitant when it comes to running for Parliament. I hope to be the role model and representation for others that I lacked when I was starting out in politics.”

Her mother moved to Iceland in 1996 and her father in 1993, the Icelandic National Broadcasting Service (RUV) earlier reported.

The family moved to Kurdistan in 2013 and then returned to Iceland three years later.

“I live with the privilege of having been born and raised here in Iceland and speaking good Icelandic,” Karim told RUV in February.

“But nevertheless, I also have an immigrant background.”

During the elections, 63 members are elected for the Althingi, the Iceland parliament, for four years.