Amat Al Alim Alsoswa

Amat Al Alim Alsoswa currently serves as the Assistant of The Secretary General, Assistant Administrator of UNDP and Director of its Regional Bureau for Arab States.

Alsoswa holds a B.A. in Mass Communications from Cairo University and an M.A. in International Communications from the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, VA Alsoswa began her career at a young age as the first women journalist of the nation. She began broadcasting at the age of 10 in a local radio show in the Yemeni governerate of Taiz. Alsoswa is notable for serving in positions as the first woman to do so, such as the first woman journalist, first woman undersecretary, first woman ambassador and first woman minister.

Earlier in her career, between 1984 -1986, she worked as Deputy TV Programs Director at Sana’a TV, where she held the most senior position as a woman in Yemen television. Subsequently, she became Chief Editor of Mutaba’at I’elamiah Journal, a monthly magazine focusing on communications and media affairs.

From 1989 to 1991, Alsoswa led the Yemeni Women’s Union before Yemen’s reunification. From 1997 to 1999, she was Undersecretary at Yemen’s Ministry of Information and Chairperson of the National Women’s Committee.

Between 2000 and 2003, she served as Yemen’s ambassador to Sweden, Denmark and the Netherlands, where she was Yemen’s Permanent Representative to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, based in The Hague.

In May 2003, Alsoswa was appointed the Minister of Human Rights in Yemen, the first human rights woman Minister in Yemen’s history. During her tenure, she established and oversaw Yemen’s first Human Rights Ministry, initiated the country’s first national human rights report, and established a public human rights resource center.

Alsoswa has published and lectured extensively and has received numerous awards and distinctions, including the Officier dans l’Ordre National de la Légion d'Honneur (France) and the Medal of the Egyptian Committee for Afro Asian Solidarity (Egypt).