This is the way to look at fates of people who are confronted with war. Leyla Imret left her Turkish hometown Cizre as a four-year-old girl, after her father had been shot under suspicion for the Kurdish PKK. Twenty years later, she returned from Germany and will be elected mayor by overwhelming majority in 2014. Leyla is committed to her Kurdish country people, gets into the visor of the Turkish state. Her city will also be a war center – also because of the battles around Syria. In 2015, she was released from the office, with the exception of her office, and was arrested several times because of suspicion of anti-state appeals. “Dil Leyla”, the cinematic portrait of the committed politician Leila Imret by the young German producer Sabrina Proske, was presented at the Stadtkino Villach on May 30th at the beginning of the European Tolerance Talks. Producer Sabrina Proske and director Azli Özarslan put the fate of the woman at the center of their movie and their reflections. “She wanted to be a mayor for her homeland, for her people, for her city, for the Kurds,” said Proske in the ensuing panel discussion. The commitment of 28 years old Leyla and her courage are impressive. The way in which she was politically disempowered and abolished left one’s breath behind. The film is to be shown in cinemas and for young people, as film-marketer Christa Auderlitzky stressed, talks with TV stations about broadcasting or recording of the subject into existing broadcasting formats are in progress. The President of Tolerance Talks Hannes Swoboda, long-standing Member of the European Parliament, referred to the extremely unclear and conflicting political situation in Turkey and the Middle East. The Kurds are not as homogeneous as they are often taught. The Turkish government has also partly improved the living conditions for Kurds, which, however, can not and should not cover political and human rights problems. The author Serafettin Yildiz, a profound expert in the history of the Middle East and the current situation, also said that some people might have more interest in conflict than in peace. Perhaps it sealed the fate of Leyla Imret. (Claus Reitan) Photos on Fotodienst.
