Career diplomat Tehmina Janjua was appointed as Pakistan's first woman foreign secretary, on Monday.
Pakistan’s Foreign Office said that Janjua will replace outgoing foreign secretary Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry.
Earlier local media reports had named Pakistan high commissioner to India Abdul Basit as the front-runner for the coveted post.
Janjua is presently serving as Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the United Nations in Geneva. She will assume the post of Foreign Secretary in the first week of March.
She holds Masters degrees from Quaid-e-Azam University, Islamabad and Columbia University, New York.
Along with being experienced in bilateral and multilateral domains both at Headquarters and Missions abroad, she is a seasoned diplomat with a career spanning over 32 years.
Janjua also served as Spokesperson of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs during 2011.
From December 2011 to October 2015, she served as the Ambassador of Pakistan to Italy.
(With inputs from PTI)