Rez Gardi, a Kurdish woman, was born in a United Nations (UN) refugee camp in Quetta, Pakistan in 1991 away from her homeland, in what is now known as the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.
Her parents - political activists - fled to Iran and then to Pakistan after her grandmother and two aunts were killed by the Iraqi regime. In 1998, Gardi found herself in New Zealand and there she developed a career as a lawyer, defending refugees and advocating on behalf of Kurds.
She has worked extensively with refugee youth, first in New Zealand in a mentoring initiative, then in the Asia-Pacific, and eventually also in Africa, in camps and Uganda. She founded Empower, a youth –led charitable trust and mentor program to address the under representation of refugees in higher education.
Gardi completed a Master of Law from Harvard Law School in 2019. She was awarded the Harvard Satter Human Rights Fellowship, and is now working to collect evidence on the genocide committed against Yezidis by Islamic State (ISIS) in 2014.
In an interview with Rudaw English on Friday, the Kurdish-Kiwi lawyer highlighted key stages of her life, her sufferings and achievements.
Rudaw: Who have you dedicated your career to? You said that you suffered when you were a refugee--what have you done to ensure the rights of Kurdish refugees?
Rez Gardi: The circumstances I was born into shaped my interest in humanitarian action, human rights, and justice. I had experienced and witnessed injustice and the denial of human rights long before I knew what those concepts meant. So I decided to dedicate my career to helping others find a voice and access justice. To fight for the rights of Kurds and other similarly marginalized communities. To do that, I decided on a career in law.
I have been a speaker and guest at many United Nations high level events, government events, and conferences. I have been invited to more than 200 events as a keynote or panel speaker and I always shared the story of Kurds and the history we have suffered.
I published two academic articles about the Kurdish Genocide (Anfal), about the human rights violations against Kurds and about the rights of Kurds to statehood. I created a documentary about Kurdistan which aired on national New Zealand television in 2013, to showcase our culture and traditions to the rest of New Zealand.
I also co-founded the Kurdish Youth Association in New Zealand. We organize events to connect the Kurdish youth of New Zealand. [We foster] community involvement focusing primarily on cultural awareness and the promotion of our rich Kurdish heritage, education, and unification of all Kurds. I also intend on working in Kurdistan as an international human rights lawyer.
You have been referred by some agencies as the first Kurdish lawyer in New Zealand. What is this based on?
First female. There is one Kurdish male who studied law in New Zealand before me. He is about 10-15 years older than me. This is based on university records and also the New Zealand Law Society. When you apply for university, you identify your ethnicity and there had been no other female prior to me in history who was identified as Kurdish in the university records.
I am also the first Kurd to graduate from Harvard Law School again according to the records stipulating as to each student’s identity – nationality, ethnicity, and race.
You have closely worked with the Auckland Women’s Lawyer Association to encourage female refugees to work in the legal profession. What contributions have you made?
I worked in partnership with the University of Auckland to establish a targeted admission scheme to support young refugees to get into law school with a slightly lower GPA given the inequities and barriers they suffered compared to other students in New Zealand. I also worked intensely with the University of Auckland to establish scholarships for students with refugee backgrounds. By sharing my story and appealing to alumni and donors, we managed to raise enough funds to have 3 scholarships per year for the next six years.
How was your first visit to Kurdistan in 2005? How did you feel?
In 2005, Saddam Hussein’s regime fell, and for the first time, I went to visit Kurdistan and meet my extended family. I had to cross three different borders to visit them all—some lived in the Kurdish region of Iraq, some in the Kurdish region of Iran, while others lived in the Kurdish region of Turkey. In the Kurdish Region of Iraq, I bought a bunch of Kurdish souvenirs— Kurdish clothes, CDs, posters, and flags. When we were entering Turkey, the Turkish military confiscated all of it. My parents had to physically pull me away from the soldier when I was questioning why my things were being taken. The response I was given was that they were taken “due to national security”.
I couldn’t understand why I could see Kurdish flags in the Kurdish region of Iraq but was told not to speak Kurdish out loud in the Kurdish region of Turkey and Iran. I didn’t know much--but even at that young age, I knew that it was unfair and I wanted to do something about it.
During this trip, something changed in me. Before, I had tried so hard to distance myself from my Kurdish identity. But having been exposed to my beautiful Kurdish culture and history, to my cousins who were my age—but who had such different lives from me, [I realized] that the only difference between me and millions of people worldwide living in conflict zones, was that I was fortunate enough to be resettled somewhere safe, I was more resolved than ever that I had a responsibility to get back in touch with my roots.
For the first time in years, a part of me wanted to embrace my Kurdishness.
Can you tell us about your project to help Yezidis? About the fellowship you were recently granted?
As a Satter Fellow in Human Rights I will work with the Free Yezidi Foundation in Duhok, in the Kurdish Region of Iraq. During my Fellowship, I will gather evidence of the targeted genocidal campaign carried out by ISIS against the Yezidis, including mass executions, kidnapping, torture, sexual violence, and other egregious human rights abuses, using a victim-centric approach. This evidence will be used to build cases in collaboration with relevant European and Iraqi/Kurdish authorities to prosecute the perpetrators.
