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Queen of law

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An adviser to UN, feisty humanitarian lawyer and Oxford graduate, this Lebanese beauty is no stranger to the spotlight. She has represented high profile names including WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.

A published author, she has given lectures at several universities, including The Hague Academy and The New School in New York.

She also trains judges, state officials and UN investigators on international criminal law and human rights and police forces in the Gulf.

Family

Amal Ramzi Clooney was born on February 3, 1978 in Beirut. When she was two, her family left Lebanon for London due to the Lebanese Civil War.  Her mother, Baria Alamuddin, is an award-winning journalist and foreign editor of the pan-Arab newspaper Al-Hayat, while her father is a retired professor from American University of Beirut.

She has one sister and two half-brothers.

Education

Clooney attended a girls’ grammar school located in Buckinghamshire. She then studied at St. Hugh’s College, Oxford, where she received an Exhibition scholarship and the Shrigley Award. 

In 2000, Clooney graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Jurisprudence (Oxford’s equivalent to the LLB) from St. Hugh’s College, Oxford.

In 2001, she entered New York University School of Law to study for the Master of Laws degree. She received the Jack J. Katz Memorial Award for excellence in entertainment law.

Career

Clooney worked at Sullivan & Cromwell in New York City for three years as part of the Criminal Defense and Investigations Group.

She worked in the Office of the Prosecutor at the UN Special Tribunal for Lebanon and at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. 

She has been involved in high-profile cases representing the state of Cambodia, the former Libyan intelligence chief Abdallah Al Senussi, Yulia Tymoshenko and Julian Assange, and is an adviser to the King of Bahrain in connection with the Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry headed by Professor M Cherif Bassiouni.

In 2013 Clooney was appointed to a number of United Nations commissions including as adviser to Special Envoy Kofi Annan on Syria and as Counsel to the 2013 Drone Inquiry by UN human rights rapporteur Ben Emmerson QC into the use of drones in counter-terrorism operations.

The next year, after the latest Israel-Gaza war, she was reportedly invited to join the U.N.’s commission investigating possible war crimes in Gaza, but turned down the appointment.

She is also a published author who was the co-editor of a book titled “The Law and Practice of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon.” She is also the author of several articles on international criminal law published by Oxford University Press

Personal Life

Clooney is a polyglot – fluent in Arabic, English and French.  She was also voted as the hottest London barrister in 2013.

She became engaged to actor George Clooney in April 2014. In July, Clooney publicly criticized the British tabloid newspaper the ‘Daily Mail’ after it claimed his fiancée’s mother opposes their marriage on religious grounds.  

When the tabloid apologized for its false story, Clooney refused to accept the apology. He called the paper “the worst kind of tabloid. One that makes up its facts to the detriment of its readers.”

The couple got married in September in Venice following a star-studded wedding ceremony two days earlier. 

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