Valerie Ann Amos, Baroness Amos, PC (born 13 March 1954) is the eighth and current UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator. Before her appointment to the UN, she had been British High Commissioner to Australia. She was made a Labour life peer in 1997 and served as Leader of the House of Lords and Lord President of the Council. When Amos was appointed Secretary of State for International Development on 12 May 2003, following the resignation of Clare Short, she became the first black woman to sit in the Cabinet of the United Kingdom. She left the Cabinet when Gordon Brown became Prime Minister. She was then nominated to become the European Union Special Representative to the African Union by Brown. In July 2010 Secretary-General of the United Nations Ban Ki-moon announced Baroness Amos's appointment to the role of Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator.

Amos was born in British Guiana (now Guyana in Latin America), and attended Bexley Technical High School for Girls (now Townley Grammar School for Girls), Townley Road, Bexleyheath, where she was the first black deputy Head Girl. She then studied at the University of Warwick, the University of Birmingham and the University of East Anglia, and was awarded an Honorary Professorship at Thames Valley University in 1995 in recognition of her work on equality and social justice.

Helen Elizabeth Clark, ONZ (born 26 February 1950) was the 37th Prime Minister of New Zealand serving three consecutive terms from 1999 to 2008, making her the fifth longest serving person to hold that office. She has been Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the third-highest UN position, since 2009.

Born in and raised just south of Hamilton, Clark graduated from the University of Auckland in 1974 and became political in her teenage years, involving herself in the New Zealand Labour Party from a young age. A junior lecturer at the University in the early 1970s, Clark entered local politics in 1974 in Auckland but was not elected to any position. Returning to lecturing at University after studying abroad, she successfully ran as a Member of Parliament for the Mount Albert electorate in 1981, a position she held until her resignation in 2009. During the 1980s and early 90s, Clark held numerous Cabinet positions in the Fourth Labour government, including Minister of Housing, Minister of Health and Minister of Conservation. She would hold the position of Deputy Prime Minister for a year.

Beyoncé Giselle Knowles-Carter (née Beyoncé Giselle Knowles; September 4, 1981), known mononymously as Beyoncé ( /biˈjɒnseɪ/ bee-YON-say), is an American singer, songwriter, record producer and actress. Born and raised in Houston, Texas, she enrolled in various performing arts schools and was first exposed to singing and dancing competitions as a child. Knowles rose to fame in the late 1990s as the lead singer of the R&B girl group Destiny's Child, one of the world's best-selling girl groups of all time.

During the hiatus of Destiny's Child, Knowles released her debut solo album, Dangerously in Love, in 2003, which spawned two number-one singles on the Billboard Hot 100—"Crazy in Love" and "Baby Boy"—and became one of the most successful albums of that year, earning her a then record-tying five Grammy Awards. Following the disbandment of Destiny's Child in 2005, Knowles released her second solo album, B'Day, in 2006, which spawned the top 10 singles "Déjà Vu", "Irreplaceable" and "Beautiful Liar". Her third solo album I Am... Sasha Fierce (2008), spawned the hit singles "If I Were a Boy", "Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It)", "Halo" and "Sweet Dreams". The album helped Knowles earn six Grammys in 2010, breaking the record for most Grammy Awards won by a female artist in one night. Knowles' fourth solo album, 4 (2011), became her fourth consecutive number one album on the Billboard 200 as a solo artist. This made her the third artist in history to have her first four studio albums debut atop the chart.

Christiane Amanpour, CBE (ⁱ/krɪstʃiˈɑːn ɑːmənˈpʊər-/; Persian: کریستین امان‌پور‎; born January 12, 1958) is the Global Affairs Anchor of ABC News. She is the host of CNN International's nightly interview program Amanpour, the network's Chief International Correspondent and runs the website Amanpour.com for the network's digital platform. She is a board member of the International Women's Media Foundation .

Raised in Tehran, Amanpour was born in London, England to Iranian father Mohammad, a Persian airline executive, and British mother, Patricia.^{[dead link]}

After completing her primary education in Iran, she was sent by her parents to boarding school in England when she was 11. She attended New Hall School, an all-girls school located in Chelmsford, Essex, England. Christiane and her family returned to England not long after the Islamic Revolution began. She has stressed that they were not forced to leave the country, but were actually returning to England when Iraq invaded Iran. The family eventually remained in England, finding it difficult to return to Iran.

Kofi Atta Annan ( /ˈkoʊfi ˈænən/; born 8 April 1938) is a Ghanaian diplomat who served as the seventh Secretary-General of the United Nations, from 1 January 1997 to 31 December 2006. Annan and the United Nations were the co-recipients of the 2001 Nobel Peace Prize for his founding of the Global AIDS and Health Fund to support developing countries in their struggle to care for their people.

Since February 2012, Annan has been the UN-Arab League envoy to Syria, to help find a resolution to ongoing conflict there.

Kofi Annan was born in Kumasi, Ghana. His twin sister Efua Atta, who died in 1991, shares the middle name Atta, which in Fante and Akan means 'twin'. Annan and his sister were born into one of the country's aristocratic families; both their grandfathers and their uncle were tribal chiefs.

In the Akan names tradition, some children are named according to the day of the week on which they were born, and/or in relation to how many children precede them. Kofi in Akan is the name that corresponds with Friday.