Sahraa Karimi is an Afghan film director and the first woman to head the Afghan Film Organization. She is the first and only woman in Afghanistan to hold a doctorate in cinema and filmmaking. A short film she made during her time at the Academy of Performing Arts in Bratislava won the award for Best Short Fiction Film at the Sun in a Net Awards (the top film awards in Slovakia). Her works include Hava, Maryam, Ayesha.