(Kurdish: Ismet Sheríf Wanlí, عیسمەت شەریف وانلی)
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Ismet was born on 21st Nov 1924 to Kurdish parents in the Kurdish quarter of the city of Damascus, Syria. His father Muhammad Cherif Vanli had migrated to Damascus from the Van region of Northern Kurdistan long before the fall of Ottoman Empire in 1918. Ismet's mother Xayriya Abdulla Alarrashi was originally from Diyarbaker and moved to Damascus with her family.
After finishing his primary and secondary school in Arabic and French Ismet moved to Beirut, Lebanon for further education, where he studied Civil Engineering for one and half year, before he realized that he has his heart on some other subjects.
Ismet moved to Lausanne, Switzerland in late 1948, where he met the prominent Kurdish scholar Nouraddin Zaza at Lausanne university. Zaza was a strong factor in enrolling young Ismet at Lausanne university. Ismet successfully finished a bachelor degree in law and become a lawyer.
Ismet continued his education at the University of Geneva where he accomplished a masters degree in History and a doctorate in Political Science. His doctoral dissertation focused on the right of the Kurdish nation to self determination and building a Kurdish homeland based on human rights and International laws.
With other Kurdish student in diaspora. Ismet established the Kurdish Student Society in Europe KSSE in 1956. Many existing student societies of Iraqi, Turkish and Iranian origin were against a separate Kurdish student societies. They argued that Kurdish interests were already imbedded in their programs.
Nonetheless, Ismet was intent on becoming the voice of the Kurdish Nation in Europe. He travelled around Europe and attended many international conferences as KSSE representative. In 1958 he was elected to represent KSSE at London International Conference, where many nations of the worlds were represented. He was also KSSE representative at annual conferences of International Student Union.
In early 1959 Ismet moved to Paris to study Kurdish History at the Sorbonne University. This was in liaison with Kamran Bedir khan, who was at that time a lecturer in Kurdish language at the Sorbonne. France was the only country in the world that provided Kurdish historical studies.
As a true believer in Kurdish nation's legitimate rights for self-determination Ismet promoted Kurdish political struggle in Europe.
Ismet was the spokesman in Europe for General Mostapha Barzani's, from 1962 to 1966, and again in 1975 and 1976. “He used to say that I did not believe in Kurdish autonomy,” stated Ismet. “I suggested many times that Barzani needed to change his views from Kurdish autonomy in Iraq to a democratic federal Iraq where Kurds could get their federal state.”
(excerpts from Ismet’s 1969 book “The Struggle of Iraqi Kurdistan” that was based. on his doctoral dissertation, where he argues that the Kurdish nation have the right to determine their own faith.) Ismet believed that many Kurdish movements did not try hard enough to achieve a Free and Independent Kurdish Homeland.
Ismet was a member of the board of directors for the organization “Kurdish Jurists in Europe,” which he had founded in Switzerland in 1985. Ten years later, he was the chairman of the “Kurdish Institute in Berlin.”
At the same time, Ismet joined the “Kurdish Parliament in Exile” (PKDW) that was renamed the “Kurdish National Congress” (KNK) in 1999. Four years later, in 2003, the health status of the Democrats did not allow for any more political actions.
As a patriot and a democrat, who was respected by Kurdish people in the whole of Kurdistan, I.C. Ismet sought tirelessly to unite the Kurdish movement under the common goal of re-establishing autonomy; throughout all of this, he never lost sight of his primary goal, which was to achieve justice for the Kurds by working continuously to illuminate their historical significance and their place as citizens in the Middle East.
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Prof. Vanli died on 9th or Nov 2011 in Lausanne, Switzerland. Ismet worked primarily on national politics of the Kurds and their history, using French language as the medium. Some of Ismet's better-known works include:
- Parez VANLI: Aspects de la Question nationale Kurde en Iran, Paris: Juillet, 1959.
Ismet Cheriff Vanli: La Question d unification de la langue Kurde existe, Londres, Mars, 1960.
Ismet Cheriff VANLI: Entertein sur le Kurdistan et la question Kurde, accorde par I auteur grec V. Sakkatos, Athenes, Juin, 1959.
