Salome Zurabishvili, 66, born to an immigrant family that fled Georgia following the Soviet occupation in 1921, was invited to serve her ancestral homeland by then President Mikheil Saakashvili.
Zurabishvili served as the country’s foreign minister in 2004-2005. She joined the opposition after being sacked from the post, starting an unsuccessful venture – the Georgia’s Way party.
In November 2010, Zurabishvili quit politics and left the country after she was appointed a coordinator of the United Nations panel of experts on Iran.
Zurabishvili returned to Georgia briefly to run for the presidency in 2013, but her bid was rejected by the Central Election Commission on the grounds of having dual citizenship.
In 2016, Zurabishvili, ran unopposed by the ruling Georgian Dream-Democratic Georgia party to be elected an MP from Tbilisi’s Mtatsminda district.
Zurabishvili held a number of positions in the French diplomatic service before joining politics in Georgia. She is a graduate of the Paris Institute of Political Studies.
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