Amal Clooney

Amal Clooney
Clooney in 2022
Amal Clooney
Born	Amal Alamuddin 3 2, 1978
Birthplace	Beirut, Lebanon
Nationality	French, British, Lebanese
Occupation	Barrister, international human rights lawyer
Known for	International human rights law, high-profile legal advocacy
Education	New York University (LLM)
Spouse(s)	Template:Marriage
Children	2

Amal Clooney (Template:Née Alamuddin; born 3 February 1978) is a French-British-Lebanese international human rights lawyer and barrister who has built a distinguished career representing clients in some of the most consequential cases in international law. Born in Beirut during the Lebanese Civil War, she was raised in England and educated at the University of Oxford and New York University School of Law, going on to practise at Doughty Street Chambers in London and to advise international bodies including the United Nations. Among her most prominent clients have been former Maldivian president Mohamed Nasheed, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, former Ukrainian prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko, Yazidi human rights activist Nadia Murad, Filipino-American journalist Maria Ressa, Azerbaijani journalist Khadija Ismayilova, and Egyptian-Canadian journalist Mohamed Fahmy. Since 2014, she has also been known publicly through her marriage to American actor George Clooney, with whom she co-founded the Clooney Foundation for Justice in 2016. She holds an appointment as Professor of Practice in International Law at the Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford, and serves as a Senior Fellow at the Oxford Institute of Technology and Justice, an institute she co-founded to explore the use of artificial intelligence in expanding access to justice.

Early Life

Amal Alamuddin was born on 3 February 1978 in Beirut, Lebanon. She was born into a Druze family of Lebanese origin. Her family left Lebanon during the Lebanese Civil War when she was two years old, relocating to the United Kingdom, where she was raised.

Growing up in England, Alamuddin attended Dr Challoner's High School, a selective grammar school for girls in Amersham, Buckinghamshire. Her upbringing in England, after a childhood marked by the upheaval of civil conflict in Lebanon, shaped what would become a lifelong engagement with issues of international justice and human rights. She holds French, British, and Lebanese nationality, reflecting the multinational character of her family background and upbringing.

Her family maintained connections to Lebanon even after emigrating, and the experience of displacement during wartime has been noted as an influence on her later career in international humanitarian and human rights law. The Alamuddin family's trajectory — from Beirut during a period of intense sectarian conflict to relative stability in the English Home Counties — provided a formative context for the legal career that would follow.

Education

Alamuddin studied at St Hugh's College, University of Oxford, where she read Jurisprudence and earned a Bachelor of Arts degree. Following her undergraduate studies at Oxford, she pursued postgraduate legal education at New York University School of Law, where she obtained a Master of Laws (LLM) degree.

Her legal education at two of the world's leading academic institutions provided a foundation in both the common law traditions of England and the American legal system, equipping her with comparative legal expertise that would prove relevant in her subsequent international practice. While at NYU, she received the Jack J. Katz Memorial Award for excellence in entertainment law.

Career

Early Legal Career

Amal Clooney began her legal career in the United States, where she worked at the New York office of Sullivan & Cromwell, a prominent international law firm. During this period, she was involved in a range of corporate and international law matters. She also served as a law clerk at the International Court of Justice in The Hague, working under Judge Thomas Buergenthal.

Her early career also included work at the United Nations, where she served as an adviser to Kofi Annan, then the UN Secretary-General, on issues related to Syria and the use of force in international law. She was also appointed to the United Nations commission of inquiry examining the rules of war violations during the conflict in Gaza.

Prior to joining Doughty Street Chambers, she worked at the Office of the Prosecutor at the Special Tribunal for Lebanon and at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.

Doughty Street Chambers

Clooney became a barrister at Doughty Street Chambers in London, one of the United Kingdom's leading sets of chambers specialising in human rights, public law, and international law. Her practice at Doughty Street has focused on international law, criminal law, human rights, and extradition. She has appeared before the International Criminal Court, the International Court of Justice, and the European Court of Human Rights, among other tribunals.

She has been a member of the United Kingdom Attorney General's Panel of Counsel, appointed to advise the UK government on matters of public international law.

High-Profile Cases and Clients

Clooney's legal career has been defined in substantial part by her representation of individuals and causes at the intersection of human rights, press freedom, and international justice.

Mohamed Nasheed

Clooney represented Mohamed Nasheed, the former president of the Maldives, who was convicted in 2015 under anti-terrorism laws in what was characterised by international observers as a politically motivated prosecution. Nasheed, the Maldives' first democratically elected president, had been charged after ordering the arrest of a judge during his tenure. Clooney's legal team worked to secure his release and brought attention to the erosion of democratic governance in the Maldives.

Julian Assange

She served as part of the legal team representing Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, in proceedings related to his extradition from the United Kingdom. The case raised significant questions about press freedom, government secrecy, and the boundaries of journalistic activity in the digital age.

Yulia Tymoshenko

Clooney was involved in the legal representation of Yulia Tymoshenko, the former prime minister of Ukraine, who was imprisoned in 2011 on charges that were widely criticised by international bodies as politically motivated. Tymoshenko's case became a significant issue in Ukraine's relations with the European Union and broader discussions of rule of law in the former Soviet states.

Mohamed Fahmy

One of Clooney's most publicised cases was her representation of Mohamed Fahmy, an Egyptian-Canadian journalist who was bureau chief for Al Jazeera English in Cairo. Fahmy was arrested along with two colleagues in December 2013 and charged with aiding the Muslim Brotherhood, a charge that drew international condemnation. Clooney served as Fahmy's international legal adviser and was vocal in her criticism of the Egyptian judicial process. The case drew attention to the state of press freedom in Egypt under the government of President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi.

Nadia Murad

Clooney represented Nadia Murad, a Yazidi woman from Iraq who was captured by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and subjected to sexual slavery. Murad became a prominent advocate for the rights of the Yazidi people and for survivors of wartime sexual violence. Clooney's legal work on Murad's behalf included efforts to bring ISIL militants before the International Criminal Court on charges of genocide. Murad was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2018 for her efforts to end the use of sexual violence as a weapon of war and armed conflict.

Maria Ressa

Clooney served as international legal counsel to Maria Ressa, the Filipino-American journalist and CEO of the news website Rappler, who faced multiple criminal charges in the Philippines that were widely viewed as retaliatory for her reporting critical of President Rodrigo Duterte. Ressa was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2021 for her efforts to safeguard freedom of expression.

Khadija Ismayilova

Clooney represented Khadija Ismayilova, an Azerbaijani investigative journalist who was imprisoned in 2014 on charges that international human rights organisations described as politically motivated. Ismayilova's reporting had focused on corruption within the ruling family of Azerbaijan. Clooney took her case to the European Court of Human Rights.

Work on Press Freedom and Drone Warfare

Beyond individual client representation, Clooney has engaged in broader advocacy on issues of press freedom and accountability in armed conflict. She has contributed to the work of the International Bar Association's Human Rights Institute, including participation in high-level panels on threats to media independence globally.

She has also been involved in work relating to the legal framework governing the use of drones in armed conflict, including contributing to reports examining the legality of targeted killings under international humanitarian law.

Academic Career

Clooney holds the position of Professor of Practice in International Law at the Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford. She is also a Senior Fellow at the Oxford Institute of Technology and Justice, an institute she co-founded with the aim of using artificial intelligence to increase access to justice globally. Her academic work has complemented her legal practice, bridging the gap between scholarship and frontline human rights advocacy.

Clooney Foundation for Justice

In 2016, Amal and George Clooney co-founded the Clooney Foundation for Justice, which works to advance justice in courtrooms, communities, and classrooms around the world. The foundation's initiatives have included the TrialWatch programme, which monitors trials globally to identify and expose cases of injustice. TrialWatch deploys trained legal monitors to observe court proceedings and produces expert legal analysis assessing the fairness of trials in countries around the world. The foundation has also supported education initiatives, including scholarships for refugees.

Clooney has been involved in scholarship programmes aimed at assisting students affected by conflict. In 2015, she was involved in funding scholarships through the 100 LIVES initiative to provide educational opportunities for young women from Lebanon, drawing on her own family's experience of displacement during the Lebanese Civil War.

Personal Life

Amal Alamuddin's relationship with American actor George Clooney became public in 2014. The couple were married on 27 September 2014 in Venice, Italy, in a ceremony attended by family, friends, and a number of prominent public figures. The wedding was a high-profile event, covered extensively in international media.

The couple have two children, twins born in 2017. Amal and George Clooney have been noted for their efforts to maintain their children's privacy, choosing not to share photographs of them publicly. In a 2026 interview, Amal Clooney discussed the couple's deliberate decision to shield their children from public attention, explaining the rationale behind their approach to parenting in the public eye.

The family divides time between residences in the United Kingdom, the United States, and Italy. George and Amal Clooney have spoken publicly about their hands-on approach to parenting, noting that they employ a single nanny for their twins.

Recognition

Amal Clooney's work in international human rights law has brought her significant public recognition. Her representation of clients in politically sensitive cases across multiple jurisdictions has placed her among the most visible practitioners in the field of international human rights litigation.

Her client Nadia Murad received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2018, and her client Maria Ressa received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2021, bringing additional international attention to the legal issues at the centre of Clooney's advocacy. While these prizes were awarded to her clients rather than to Clooney herself, her role in providing legal counsel in both cases was noted in coverage of the awards.

In addition to her legal recognition, Clooney has received attention for her public appearances and personal style. She has been featured on the covers of numerous international publications and has appeared regularly at high-profile events alongside her husband. In February 2026, the couple attended the Omega House opening night during the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan.

Her appointment to the University of Oxford as Professor of Practice in International Law represents a significant academic recognition, situating her legal work within a scholarly framework at one of the world's leading universities.

Legacy

Amal Clooney's career has intersected several of the most pressing issues in contemporary international law: press freedom, accountability for mass atrocities, the rights of political prisoners, and the legal frameworks governing armed conflict. Her client roster reads as a catalogue of some of the early 21st century's most significant human rights cases, spanning multiple continents and legal systems.

Her work on behalf of journalists — including Mohamed Fahmy, Maria Ressa, and Khadija Ismayilova — has contributed to broader international discourse on the protection of press freedom and the legal mechanisms available to journalists facing prosecution in hostile jurisdictions. These cases have highlighted the vulnerability of independent journalism in authoritarian and semi-authoritarian states and the role that international legal advocacy can play in challenging such prosecutions.

Through the Clooney Foundation for Justice and its TrialWatch programme, Clooney has contributed to the development of institutional mechanisms for monitoring trial fairness globally. The programme represents an attempt to create systematic, data-driven assessments of judicial proceedings in countries where the independence of the judiciary is in question.

Her co-founding of the Oxford Institute of Technology and Justice reflects an engagement with emerging questions about how technological tools, including artificial intelligence, might be deployed to address longstanding barriers to justice. This work positions Clooney at the intersection of technology, law, and human rights — a nexus that is likely to grow in significance in the coming decades.

The combination of high-profile litigation, academic scholarship, institutional innovation through the foundation, and public visibility has made Clooney one of the most recognisable figures in the field of international human rights law. Her career has brought international legal issues to broader public attention in ways that few practitioners in the field have achieved.