A graduate of the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London, he is a regular contributor to The Guardian, as well as Al-Monitor. Until 2014 he worked for the independent Kurdish newspaper Hawlati, in Suleimaniyya, Iraqi Kurdistan. Diwan caught up with Hawramy to get his views on the death this week of Jalal Talabani, the former leader of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan.