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Outlook: The Danish woman who went to fight IS

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Joanna Palani

28/02/2019 GMT

The Danish woman who went to fight IS

BBC World Service - Outlook, The Danish woman who went to fight IS

Joanna Palani on why she took the drastic decision that's led to her imprisonment

When the Islamic State group took over large areas of Syria, Joanna Palani left her home in Denmark and joined an all-female Kurdish militia to fight IS in Syria

Joanna Palani grew up in Denmark but she's from a long line of Kurdish fighters. When Joanna was a teenager, she carried on this tradition, by packing up her bags and travelling to Syria to join an all-female Kurdish militia. It was in Syria that she witnessed the horrifying reality of the conflict with the Islamic State group. Eventually, when she returned to Denmark, she was arrested for breaking a travel ban that had been placed on her. She was aware that she was breaking the law as travelling to Syria to fight can result in prison sentences in many countries, including the UK. At the time of our first broadcast of this interview Joanna was in prison in Denmark. She has written a book called 'Freedom Fighter'.

Tony Allen is a founding father of Afrobeat. Living in Nigeria in the late 1960s and 70s, he and Fela Kuti created the new genre by mixing West African music with jazz and funk. Over a decade later, in Detroit, a young American artist was also doing something radical. Jeff Mills is a DJ who helped to create a style of electronic dance music known as techno. The two pioneers got together recently to see what happened when their musical styles combined.

Off one of London's busiest streets, the Strand, you will find 'The India Club'. It was set up in the 1950s, not long after India's independence from the UK. One of it's founding members was Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime minister of a newly independent India and if you go to the club now, it doesn't look as though much has been changed since those early days.

Image: Joanna Palani
Credit: Nikolai Linares

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