Yga Kostrzewa

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Yga Kostrzewa, born Inga Krystyna Kostrzewa on September 12, 1973, is a Polish economist, writer and LGBTQ+ rights activist. She studied at the T. Baird State Music School and earned a master’s degree in management from the University of Warsaw in 1998. Since 1998 she has worked with Lambda Warsaw, a Polish LGBTQ+ organization, serving as its chair from 2005 to 2007 and as its spokesperson from 2002 to 2022. She campaigns for marriage equality and for equal rights on issues like taxation, housing, inheritance and burial for same-sex couples. She is also part of Trans-Fuzja’s council and the Congress of Women.

In 2005, Warsaw Mayor Lech Kaczyński banned the city’s gay pride parade. Kostrzewa helped challenge this decision at the European Court of Human Rights, with colleagues and the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights. The court said the ban violated the right to assembly. Kostrzewa edited the Polish LGBT magazine Inaczej. In 2024 she co-authored How to write and talk about LGBTQIA+ persons and has written about queer history and culture in Warsaw.