List of German people of Kurdish descent

Last updated June 24, 2025

This is a list of notable individuals who are of full or partial Kurdish origin who grew up and/or live in Germany.

Academia and Medicine

Jamal Nebez, linguist, mathematician, politician, author, translator and writer
Bachtyar Ali, novelist, intellectual, literary critic, essayist, and poet
Rauf Ceylan, German-Turkish sociologist and author
Khalil Rashow, academic, writer, and researcher
Nadia Murad – human rights activist and Nobel Peace Prize laureate
Khanna Omarkhali - academic and researcher
Gülşen Aktaş, educator

Artists

Shwan Kamal
Bahzad Sulaiman – performance maker and visual artist

Athletes

Agit Kabayel, boxer
Deniz Naki, football player
Mahmoud Dahoud, football player
Baker Barakat, boxer and kickboxer
Deniz Undav, football player
Mirkan Aydın, football player
Aias Aosman, football player
Shergo Biran, football player
Youssef Amyn, football player
Joan Oumari, football player^[1]
Hassan Oumari, football player^[1]
Dilan Ağgül, football player

Musicians

Rappers

Haftbefehl (Kurdish father and Turkish mother)
KC Rebell
Eko Fresh (Kurdish mother and Turkish father)
Azad
Xatar
Mudi (Kurdish father and Lebanese mother)
Kurdo
Eno
Capo (Kurdish father and Turkish mother)
AK Ausserkontrolle
Fero47
Bero Bass

Singers

DJs

Kurd Maverick

Politicians

in German parties

Ferat Koçak,
Sevim Dağdelen, German politician and a member of the Left Party (Die Linke)
Cem Ince, German politician (The Left)
Evrim Sommer, German politician
Gökay Akbulut, German politician and social scientist. She is currently serving in the Bundestag (federal parliament) as a member of The Left Party from the German federal state of Baden-Württemberg
Kassem Taher Saleh, German civil engineer and politician of the Alliance 90/The Greens
Kenan Engin, German-Kurdish political scientist
Leyla Güven, Kurdish Politician
Lamiya Haji Bashar, human rights activist. She was awarded the Sakharov Prize jointly with Nadia Murad in 2016
Ali Atalan, Kurdish-German politician of Yazidi faith. He is a former member of the Landtag of North Rhine-Westphalia with Die Linke in Germany, and the Turkish Parliament with the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP)
Cansu Özdemir, German politician of The Left from Hamburg. She is a member of the Hamburg Parliament
Serdar Yüksel, German politician of SPD from Essen. He is since 2025 a member of the Bundestag
Muhterem Aras, German politician of the Alliance 90/The Greens party. She has been a Member of the Landtag of Baden-Württemberg for the constituency Stuttgart I since May 2011, and Landtagspräsidentin (speaker) since May 2016
Hamide Akbayir German politician
Hüseyin Kenan Aydın, German politician and member of Die Linke.

in foreign parties or organisations

Haji Ahmadi (Iran; grew up in Iran and lives in exile in Germany)
Leyla İmret (grew up in Germany and lived in Turkey)
Feleknas Uca (grew up in Germany and lives in Turkey)
Cuneyd Zapsu

Cinema

Züli Aladağ, film director, film producer, and screenwriter (Kurdish and Turkish origin)^[2]
Ayşe Polat, script writer and film director^[3]
Yasemin Şamdereli, German film director, screen writer and actress
Düzen Tekkal, German author, television journalist, filmmaker, war correspondent, political scientist, and social entrepreneur of Kurdish–Yazidi descent
Nizamettin Ariç, film director

Writers and Literature

Seyran Ateş (Kurdish father and Turkish mother)^[4]
Rohat Alakom
Lamiya Haji Bashar
Eskerê Boyîk
Nadia Murad
Bachtyar Ali
Eskerê Boyîk, writer
Khalil Rashow
Fatma Aydemir, author and journalist
Sherko Fatah, German writer
Meşale Tolu, German journalist and translator

Miscellaneous

Hatun Sürücü, victim of a so-called "honor killing" by her youngest brother in 2005

References

1 2 "الحارس حسن يلتحق بالتمرين والعمري جديد المحترفين". الأخبار (in Arabic). Retrieved 30 June 2020.
↑ "Züli Aladag, film director". Deutsche Welle. 2015. Retrieved 2 January 2021. Whenever I'm asked about my nationality, I say, "I'm a German of Kurdish and Turkish descent."
↑ Cox, Ayça Tunç (2012), "Hyphenated Identities: The Reception of Turkish German Cinema in the Turkish Daily Press", in Hake, Sabine; Mennel, Barbara (eds.), Turkish German Cinema in the New Millennium: Sites, Sounds, and Screens, Berghahn Books, p. 169, ISBN 978-0857457691, The second-generation filmmaker Ayşe Polat's response to a question about how she describes her identity underscores the complexity of the issue, for she states that she is simultaneously German, Turkish and Kurdish.
↑ Eddy, Melissa (2018), "By Taking a Bullet, a Muslim Woman Finds Her Calling", The New York Times , retrieved 29 March 2021, Born in Istanbul to a Turkish mother and a Kurdish father, she emigrated with her parents to what was then West Berlin in the late 1960s, part of the first large wave of Muslim immigrants who came to fill the blue-collar jobs needed to rebuild the German economy after World War II. Ms. Ates was 6 when she and her four siblings moved into a one-room apartment with their parents.

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.

[:4-1] 1 2 "الحارس حسن يلتحق بالتمرين والعمري جديد المحترفين". الأخبار (in Arabic). Retrieved 30 June 2020.

[2] "Züli Aladag, film director". Deutsche Welle. 2015. Retrieved 2 January 2021. Whenever I'm asked about my nationality, I say, "I'm a German of Kurdish and Turkish descent."

[3] Cox, Ayça Tunç (2012), "Hyphenated Identities: The Reception of Turkish German Cinema in the Turkish Daily Press", in Hake, Sabine; Mennel, Barbara (eds.), Turkish German Cinema in the New Millennium: Sites, Sounds, and Screens, Berghahn Books, p. 169, ISBN 978-0857457691, The second-generation filmmaker Ayşe Polat's response to a question about how she describes her identity underscores the complexity of the issue, for she states that she is simultaneously German, Turkish and Kurdish.

[4] Eddy, Melissa (2018), "By Taking a Bullet, a Muslim Woman Finds Her Calling", The New York Times , retrieved 29 March 2021, Born in Istanbul to a Turkish mother and a Kurdish father, she emigrated with her parents to what was then West Berlin in the late 1960s, part of the first large wave of Muslim immigrants who came to fill the blue-collar jobs needed to rebuild the German economy after World War II. Ms. Ates was 6 when she and her four siblings moved into a one-room apartment with their parents.

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]