Dilsa Demirbag Sten

Who is Dilsa Demirbag Sten?

Dilsa Demirbag Sten is a Swedish author and journalist. A self-described liberal atheist, she is a frequent commentator on topics such as integration, honor violence, religious oppression of women and Islamic fundamentalism. She is a contributor to the newspapers Expressen, Östgöta Correspondenten, Göteborgs-Posten, Dagens Nyheter, Fokus and Axess. She has also hosted an own television show on Swedish TV8. She is a secular humanist and a board member of the Swedish Humanist Association.

Dilsa Demirbag was born into a Kurdish nomadic family in Kirvan, a small village in eastern Turkey. She came to Sweden with her family in 1976 and grew up in the cities of Karlstad and Uppsala. At young age she was brought by her family into a forced marriage, but eventually managed to break the engagement and then moved to Stockholm. She has worked at Riksteatern, Amnesty International and as a special adviser to the former Swedish Minister for Integration Leif Blomberg. She holds a Bachelor of Arts-degree in political science and history from Stockholm University.

Her autobiography Stamtavlor, which deals with her family's Kurdish descent, was published in 2005.