Zeynel Abidin Kizilyaprak is a renowned Kurdish journalist and essayist. He has been a victim of political persecution in Turkey and sentenced to prison several times because of his work as a journalist. With the help of International P.E.N., he was able to leave Turkey in 2003 to accept a scholarship in Germany. He has received fellowships in 2003 from the Heinrich Böll Foundation and the IHAG, and the Hamburg Foundation for Politically Persecuted People in 2004. In 2004, he was awarded the Hellman/Hammett Award from Human Rights Watch. Kizilyaprak was also elected honorary member of the British, Swedish and Canadian PEN organizations.

Kizilyaprak is also founder and board member of the foundation “Kürt-Kav”, the Research Foundation for Kurdish Culture (founded in 1996 in Istanbul). He currently lives in Istanbul.