Kersti Kaljulaid

Kersti Kaljulaid served as the President of the Republic of Estonia from 2016 to 2021 and as President of the Estonian Olympic Committee from 2024 to 2026. Before her presidency, she was a Member of the European Court of Auditors, advised Prime Minister Mart Laar, and held various senior positions in the energy, investment banking, and telecommunications sectors. Holding degrees in genetic engineering and economics, she has also been a member of the Supervisory Board of the Estonian Genome Center and served as Chair of the Council of the University of Tartu from 2012 to 2016.

In the summer of 2021, UN Secretary-General António Guterres appointed President Kaljulaid as the Global Advocate for the “Every Woman Every Child” strategy for the following two years. In 2023, she co-chaired the United Nations High-Level Panel on the Teaching Profession. She was also the first Estonian to be featured on Forbes’ list of the World’s 100 Most Powerful Women.

She is a member of several prestigious boards, including Yalta European Strategy, the GLOBSEC Advisory Council, the Microsoft Technology & National Security Advisory Council, the Multiverse AI Advisory Board, and the Stockholm Environment Institute Board. In 2021, she founded the President Kaljulaid Foundation, an NGO and think tank dedicated to advancing democracy, empowering vulnerable communities, and navigating the societal impact of digitalization. Since the outbreak of the full-scale war in Ukraine, the Foundation has also raised around €400,000 for Ukrainian causes, including journalism and education.

Kersti Kaljulaid has become a sought-after speaker and moderator at high-level forums on digital, security, and foreign policy issues, as well as on broader societal and economic change. President Kaljulaid is a vocal advocate for human rights, the rule of law, freedom of speech, and democracy. One of the guiding principles of her presidency was articulated during her inauguration: “I am never silent when our security is in question, when our freedoms are at stake, or when those weaker than us are treated unjustly.