Leila Inanna Sultan receives the Swedish Radio Poetry Prize 2026 for "a magnificent poetic construction that follows the refugee's journey into the mazes of the asylum process." The jury describes her poetry collection "Straffkolonien" as a clash between "the crystal-clear poetry of love" and "the nightmarish machine language of bureaucracy."
"Poems were the only way I could approach these questions. The book is born out of deep sorrow and irrepressible love," Leila Inanna Sultan said in a press release.
"Straffkolonien" is her debut book and earlier this year she also received the Borås Tidnings debutant prize for it.
The Swedish Radio Poetry Prize is worth 30,000 kronor.
