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Waris Dirie

Waris Dirie
واريس ديري
Waris Dirie - Bratislava 2010.png
Born 1965 (age 51–52)
Galkayo, Somalia
Occupation Model, social activists, author, actress, UN Special Ambassador (1997–2003)
Title Chevalier of the Légion d'honneur

Waris Dirie (Somali: Waris Diiriye, Arabic: واريس ديري‎‎) (born 1965) is a Somali model, author, actress and social activist. From 1997 to 2003, she served as a UN Special Ambassador.

Waris was born into a nomadic family in 1965 in Galkayo, Somalia. At the age of thirteen, she fled to Mogadishu in order to escape an arranged marriage to a much older man. There, she briefly lived with an older sister and her family. Waris along with a few relatives later moved to London, where she resided with and worked for an uncle who had been appointed Somali ambassador. When his term in office ended, Waris remained in the city and held a job at a local McDonald's. She also began evening classes to learn English.

By chance, Waris was discovered by photographer Terence Donovan, who helped secure for her the cover of the 1987 Pirelli Calendar. From there, her modeling career took off, appearing in advertisements for top brands such as Chanel, Levi's, L'Oréal and Revlon.

In 1987, Waris played a minor role in the James Bond movie The Living Daylights. She also appeared on the runways of London, Milan, Paris and New York City, and in fashion magazines such as Elle, Glamour and Vogue. This was followed in 1995 by a BBC documentary entitled A Nomad in New York about her modeling career.

In 1997, at the height of her modeling career, Waris spoke for the first time with Laura Ziv of the women's magazine Marie Claire about the female genital mutilation (FGM) that she had undergone as a child, at the age of three along with her two sisters. That same year, Waris became a UN ambassador for the abolition of FGM. She later paid her mother a visit in her native Somalia.


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