Associated Press - Wednesday October 25, 2000
Edith M. Lederer, Associated Press Writer

Obaid, an American-educated expert on women's issues who has worked for the United Nations for 25 years, will replace Dr. Nafis Sadik as executive director of the U.N. Population Fund on Jan. 1.

Introducing Obaid at a news conference, Secretary-General Kofi Annan called her an outstanding U.N. professional whose work in social affairs has made her "sensitive to the cultural issues" involved in promoting often controversial population measures.

"Her record in working for reproductive rights for women, in promoting choice and improving women's health, is second to none," Annan said.

"She is conscious of the vital importance of promoting the rights of women and adolescent girls in order to safeguard their reproductive health, and she is aware of the need to focus on the threat posed by HIV/AIDS ."

Obaid told Annan he had already entered the history books in many different ways but she took pride that "today all the Saudi women are recognizing you broke the ceiling one more time for Saudi women - and we thank you for that."

Diplomats and population activists said the Saudi government campaigned extensively behind the scenes for Obaid's selection.

Obaid, 55, is in many ways a pioneer in the oil-rich conservative Muslim nation. Though some Saudi officials have called for women there to play a greater role in society, they are still not allowed to drive, need written permission from male relatives to travel, are banned from mingling with men and must be covered in public from head to toe.

In 1951, when Saudi Arabia had no schools for girls, Obaid's father sent her to the American College for Girls in Cairo. She then became the first Saudi woman to receive government scholarships to attend a university abroad - earning a bachelor's degree from Mills College in Oakland, Calif., and a master's and doctorate from Wayne State University in Detroit.

"What they have sowed - put in me at that stage - they are reaping now," Obaid said in an interview.

Obaid, who has spent the past two years running the Population Fund's division for Arab states and Europe, will take charge of about 1,000 staff members in some 80 countries. The fund is the world's largest international source of population assistance - and its largest supplier of condoms for family planning and AIDS prevention.

Obaid said she hopes to expand the fund's programs and give priority to cutting the number of mothers dying in childbirth, promoting girls' education and equality for women and preventing the spread of HIV/AIDS.

Sadik, the outgoing agency head, is a Pakistani obstetrician-gynecologist who became the first woman to head a U.N. agency in 1987. Annan praised her for doing "a remarkable job."

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