Micheline Calmy-Rey was elected President of the Swiss Confederation in 2007 and 2011 for a one year term.
Calmy-Rey was born on July 8, 1945, in Sion in the Canton of Valais. She studied at the Graduate Institute in Geneva where she obtained a Master’s degree in Political Science. For 20 years, she ran a small enterprise active in the book-distribution business.
As deputy of the Social Democratic Party, she was member of the Parliament of the Canton of Geneva from 1981 to 1997. She assumed the office of President of the Cantonal Government from 2001 to 2002. She was member of the board of the BCGE (Banque cantonale de Genève) and the SNB (Swiss National Bank).
Micheline Calmy-Rey was elected to the Federal Council on 4 December 2002. She served as head of the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs (FDFA) from 2003 to the end of 2011. In 2010, she took up the presidency of the Council of Europe and chaired the Ministerial Conference of the Francophonie in 2010 and 2011. In May 2012, she was nominated visiting professor at the University of Geneva. She is member of the board of Governors of the International Crisis Group, the Center for International Relations and Sustainable Development, Geneva Call and President of the Martin Ennals Awards Foundation.
She is the author of La Suisse que je souhaite, a book of Swiss Foreign Policy.
