Asma Mohamed Abdalla
Asma Mohamed Abdalla (also: Asmaa, Abdallah, Abdullah; ) is a Sudanese diplomat. She became Sudan's first female Minister of Foreign Affairs in early September 2019 in the Transitional Cabinet of Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok, during the 2019 Sudanese transition to democracy. Early life and education Asma was born in 1946 in Khartoum. She graduated in 1969 from the University of Khartoum after studying economics and political science. Diplomatic career Asma was a Sudanese ambassador, employed by the Sudanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, prior to the Omar al-Bashir presidency. She was one of the first three women employed by the Foreign Ministry. Asma was dismissed from the Ministry following the 1989 Sudanese coup d'état that brought Omar al-Bashir to power and persecuted by the new government. According to UNICEF scanned paper records of 1990, Asma was Fourth Vice-chairman of the UNICEF Executive Board during 1990/1991. A 2010 UNICEF list of the history of the UNICEF Executive Board disputes this, claiming that Chipo Zindoga from Zimbabwe was Fourth Vice-chairman during 1990/1991 and 1991/1992 and that Asma was never a member of the UNICEF Executive Board, up to and including 2010. In response to her persecution by the al-Bashir government, Asma chose to