SULAIMANI (ESTA) — Iceland has elected a female-majority parliament, a landmark for gender equality in the North Atlantic island nation, including a Kurd who becomes the youngest candidates to win a parliament seat.
Voters in Iceland elected 33 women to the 63-seat parliament, up from 24 in the last election, according to Reuters.
Among the incoming members of parliament are 21-year-old law student Lenya Run Taha Karim, a daughter of Kurdish immigrants who is from the opposition Pirate party.
“It was certainly a different experience to wake up to phone calls, messages and news that I have broken a record as the youngest MP in the history of Iceland. The first Kurds too,” Run said in a tweet.
The Icelandic National Broadcasting Service (RUV) reported that Lenya’s mother moved to Iceland in 1996 and her father in 1993.
Iceland was ranked the most gender-equal country in the world for the 12th year running in a World Economic Forum (WEF) report released in March.
As of last year, only three other countries – Rwanda, Cuba and United Arab Emirates – had more women than men in parliament, according to data compiled by the World Bank.
In Europe, Sweden and Finland have 47% and 46% women in parliament, respectively.
