She is the subject of a 2017 documentary film, Dil Leyla and winner of the ILHR's 2018 Carl von Ossietzky Medal.

"[5] Although Cizre was one of Turkey's most impoverished towns after decades of conflict, the government had initiated a peace process with the Kurdish rebels and it was a time of relative calm.

"[7] She planned to help create a normal life for the community, building parks and playgrounds and "giving children a chance to have the childhood she never had.

İmret said, "The main difference between the HDP and the PKK is that the former is a political party aiming to participate in the electoral process at the national level ...

[3][6] She was charged with "inciting the public to an armed uprising against the state"[1] after calling the blanket operation against Cizre a "civil war".

[15] İmret was detained in November 2015,[16] and feared killed in a siege in December after she left a message on social media saying tanks had surrounded the town, her home was being shelled and she was ready for death.

"[23] İmret was later released but banned from leaving the country, however she fled Turkey by going to the Kurdistan Regional Government in Iraq and then to Germany,[1][6][13] where she applied for and received political asylum in 2017.

[6][24] İmret is the subject of the 2017 German documentary Dil Leyla by Asli Ozarslan, filmed while she was in hiding in Turkey.

[2] In 2018, İmret testified as an expert witness at the Permanent Peoples' Tribunal in Paris on human rights violations and war crimes in Cizre.

[1][12] She is part of a group carrying out a hunger strike to protest Turkey's cross-border operation in Syria's Afrin District.

"[3] She shared the award with German social worker and human rights activist Ottmar Miles Paul.