Category: International Leader / page 4

Michaelle Jean
Michaelle Jean


Michaëlle Jean served as the 27th governor general of Canada from September 2005 to October 2010. Jean was Canada's first governor general of Caribbean origin and the third woman to serve in this position. From January 2015 - 2019 she assumed office as the secretary-general of the Organisation internationale de la Francophonie, the first woman to hold that position. Jean was born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. She immigrated to Canada with her family in 1968, fleeing the dictatorial regime of the time. After earning a Bachelor of Arts in Italian and […]
Queen Noor of Jordan
Queen Noor of Jordan


Queen Noor of Jordan, also known as Noor Al-Hussein, is the American-born widow of King Hussein of Jordan. She is an advocate for issues of international exchange and understanding of Arab, Muslim and Western relations, and conflict prevention and recovery issues such as refugees, missing persons, poverty, climate change and disarmament. Her peace-building work has focused on the Middle East, the Balkans, Central and Southeast Asia, Latin America and Africa. Queen Noor was born Lisa Najeeb Halaby on August 23, 1951, in Washington, D.C. Her father, Najeeb Halaby, was an […]
Kersti Kaljulaid
Kersti Kaljulaid


Kersti Kaljulaid served as the president of Estonia from 2016-2021. She was the first female, and youngest, head of state in Estonia since the country declared independence in 1918. Kaljulaid graduated from the University of Tartu in 1992 with a degree in genetics. She completed her master’s studies in economics and business administration in 2001. From 1996 to 1999, Kaljulaid worked in several corporate positions in Estonia. From 1999 to 2002, she was the economic advisor of Estonian Prime Minister Mart Laar, and from 2002 to 2004, she was the […]
Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner
Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner


Cristina Fernández de Kirchner is an Argentine lawyer and politician who served as president of Argentina from December 2007 to December 2015 and as vice president from December 2019 to December 2022. She was the second woman to serve as president of Argentina (after Isabel Martínez de Perón, 1974 to 1976), the first directly elected female president and the first woman re-elected. She succeeded her husband, Néstor Kirchner, who served as president from 2003 to 2007. Kirchner was born February 19, 1953, in La Plata, Argentina. She attended the National […]
Mari Kiviniemi
Mari Kiviniemi


Mari Johanna Kiviniemi, deputy secretary-general of the OECD since August 2014, served as prime minister of Finland from 2010 - 2011, Finland's second female prime minister. Kiviniemi was born September 27, 1968 in Seinäjoki, Finland. She graduated from the University of Helsinki with a degree in economics. She first ran as a candidate for member of parliament in 1991, garnering less than 5,000 votes, while serving as the secretary general of the Centre Party Student Union. The year after completing the work for her master's degree in social sciences, she […]
Jadranka Kosor
Jadranka Kosor


Jadranka Kosor was elected as Croatia's first woman prime minister since independence on July 6, 2009, after Ivo Sanader's sudden resignation from the post, and served until December 23, 2011. Kosor also replaced Sanader as the head of the ruling Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ), serving from July 4, 2009 to May 21, 2012. Born on July 1, 1953, in Pakrac, Croatia, Kosor completed her secondary education in the town of Lipik. She graduated with a law degree from the Faculty of Law in Zagreb, where she became a print and […]
Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga
Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga


Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga was elected prime minister of Sri Lanka in 1994 and then president later that same year. She was re-elected to a second term in 1999 and survived an assassination attempt in 2000. Kumaratunga was born June 29, 1945. Her father, S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike, was a senior minister of the government at the time of her birth and later became prime minister. Her mother, Sirimavo Bandaranaike, became the world's first woman prime minister in 1961. Kumaratunga graduated from the University of Paris with a degree in political science. She […]
Christine Lagarde
Christine Lagarde


Christine Lagarde was managing director of the International Monetary Fund from July 5, 2011 until Sept. 12, 2019. On Nov. 1, 2019, she assumed office as president of the European Central Bank. Lagarde is the first female finance minister of a G-7 economy, the first woman to head the IMF, and the first female president of the European Central Bank. Lagarde was born on January 1, 1956 in Paris, France. As a teenager, she was a member of the French national synchronized swimming team. After completing high school in 1973, […]
Wangari Maathai
Wangari Maathai


Wangari Muta Maathai was a Kenyan environmental political activist who was the first African woman to receive the Nobel Peace Prize, in 2004. She founded the Green Belt Movement, an environmental non-governmental organization focused on the planting of trees, environmental conservation and women's rights. Maathai was born April 1, 1940, in the village of Ihithe, Nyeri District, in Kenya. Her family was Kikuyu, the most populous ethnic group in Kenya. She was one of some 300 Kenyans selected to study in the United States in 1960 through a program funded […]
Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo
Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo


Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo served as president of the Republic of the Philippines from 2001 to 2009, the country's second female president. She was also the country's first female vice president. Macapagal was born April 5, 1947. Her father was Diosdado Macapagal, who later served as Philippine president from 1961 to 1965. She studied at Georgetown University in Washington, DC, and graduated magna cum laude from Assumption College with a bachelor's degree in commerce. She earned a master's degree in economics from the Ateneo de Manila University, and a master's degree and […]