14 Facts About Nujeen Mustafa

Nujeen Mustafa is a Kurdish Syrian refugee and activist with cerebral palsy.

Nujeen Mustafa was raised in Aleppo, Syria, and gained attention after traveling 3,500 miles by wheelchair, fleeing conflict in the Syrian Civil War, before arriving and resettling in Germany.

Nujeen Mustafa was listed as one of the BBC's 100 Women in 2018, and her story was featured on the television show Last Week Tonight with John Oliver.

Nujeen Mustafa later compared the situation to being under house arrest:.

Nujeen Mustafa learned English from watching television, including the American soap opera Days of Our Lives.

Nujeen Mustafa traveled, in her own words, as a "pay-as-you-go refugee", meaning that she did not have enough money to pay smugglers to take her the entire way, and had to find new ways to progress each day, from taxis to trains in addition to smugglers.

Nujeen Mustafa was granted asylum by Germany in late 2016.

Nujeen Mustafa gained attention during her journey to Europe as a so-called "refugee celebrity", as she was interviewed by journalists while en route.

In 2018, Nujeen Mustafa was listed as one of the BBC's 100 Women.

Nujeen Mustafa has given talks at the Palace of Nations in Geneva, TEDx in Iraq and the United Kingdom, and the presentation of the Nansen Refugee Award in 2017.

In February 2019, Nujeen Mustafa was announced as the winner of the Alison Des Forges Award for Extraordinary Activism, given out by Human Rights Watch, which cited the role her story played in helping to "move policymakers in the European Union" on the issue of the delivery of humanitarian aid to those with disabilities.

In 2015, Nujeen Mustafa was featured on a segment of the television show Last Week Tonight hosted by John Oliver, covering the treatment of refugees, and which included segments from interviews she had given to the BBC.

The character EJ addressed Nujeen Mustafa, recognizing the difficulty of her journey as a refugee and calling her "our kind of people".

Nujeen Mustafa has published two books, both co-authored with British journalist and writer Christina Lamb:.