Sahle-Work Zewde

Sahle-Work Zewde (; born 21 February 1950) is an Ethiopian diplomat who served as president of Ethiopia from 2018 to 2024, the first woman to hold the office. She was elected as president unanimously by members of the Federal Parliamentary Assembly on 25 October 2018.

American business magazine Forbes, on its annual edition of the Forbes list of The World's 100 Most Powerful Women, listed Sahle-Work as the 93rd most powerful woman in the world, making her the highest-ranking African woman on the list.

Early life and education Born in Addis Ababa, Sahle-Work is of Amhara origin. She is the first born out of four children. She attended primary and secondary school at Lycée Guebre-Mariam in Addis Ababa, after which she studied natural science at the University of Montpellier, France. She is fluent in Amharic, French, and English.

A veteran in the Ethiopian foreign service, Sahle-Work served as Ambassador to Senegal, with accreditation to Mali, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Gambia and Guinea, from 1989 to 1993. This was a prominent position, as Djibouti was the landlocked country's primary route to sea trade. Her involvement here gave her experience in trade issues. She held this position until 2002.

Sahle-Work subsequently held other high level positions including Permanent Representative of Ethiopia to the African Union and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and Director-General for African Affairs in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ethiopia.

In 2011, Ban appointed Sahle-Work as Director-General of the United Nations Office at Nairobi (UNON). Under Sahle-Work, the Nairobi office became a more important UN hub for East and Central Africa, according to the 2012 Africa Yearbook.

In June 2018, Secretary-General António Guterres appointed Sahle-Work as his Special Representative to the African Union and Head of the United Nations Office to the African Union (UNOAU) at the level of Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations. and the fourth president since the ruling Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) coalition was elected in the newly established Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia in 1995. She is expected to serve two six-year terms.

Prior to her presidency, Sahle-Work had no experience in domestic politics. She also pardoned more than 1,500 prisoners on 2 April 2020.

On 19 December 2020, Sahle-Work commuted the death sentences of former Derg officials Berhanu Bayeh and Adis Tedla to life imprisonment. They had been granted safe haven in the Italian embassy soon after the Derg regime's collapse in 1991 and had been living there ever since. Italy refused to give them up because of its long-standing opposition to capital punishment. Berhanu and Adis had been sentenced in absentia to death in 2008, but were subsequently granted parole on 24 December.

Sahle-Work demanded an end to the Tigray War between the Ethiopian government and the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) through "negotiations without any conditions", though she also supported countering TPLF attacks "with the necessary measures".