Deeyah Khan

Deeyah Khan is an Emmy and Peabody award-winning documentary film director and producer best known for Banaz: A Love Story (2012), Jihad: A Story of the Others (2015) and White Right: Meeting the Enemy (2017). Born in Norway to immigrant parents of Pashtun and Punjabi ancestry, Deeyah's experience of living between different cultures, both the beauty and the challenges, shapes her artistic vision. Her 2012 multi-award winning documentary Banaz: A Love Story chronicles the life and death of Banaz Mahmod, a young British Kurdish woman murdered by her family in a so-called honour killing. Deeyah's second film, the Grierson and Bafta award-nominated Jihad, involved two years of interviews and filming with Islamic extremists, convicted terrorists and former jihadis. In her most recent Bafta-nominated film, White Right: Meeting the Enemy Deeyah sat down face-to-face with US neo-Nazis and white nationalists. In 2016, she became the first UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador for artistic freedom and creativity. Deeyah is also the founder of sister-hood, a digital magazine spotlighting the voices of women of Muslim heritage She has been described by The Times of London thus: "To say Deeyah Khan is an inspiration is an understatement. She is one of the bravest, most indomitable women... facing down bullies and extremists with intelligence and unflinching spirit."