She is the 66th secretary of state and the second one to serve under George W Bush. Rice was born on November 14, 1954, in Birmingham, Alabama, the only child of Presbyterian minister Reverend John Wesley Rice, Jr., and his wife, Angelena Ray.
During the violent days of the Civil Rights Movement, Reverend Rice armed himself and kept guard over the house while Condoleezza practiced the piano inside. At age fifteen, she began classes with the goal of becoming a concert pianist but soon realized that she was not of a good enough standard to support herself through her music.
Rice recalls various times in which she suffered discrimination and persecution on account of her skin color. She first worked in the State Department in 1977, during Jimmy Carters’ administration, as an intern in the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. Rice served in President George H W Bush's administration as director, and then senior director, of Soviet and East European Affairs in the National Security Council.
During the 2004 U.S. presidential election, Rice was the first national security advisor to campaign for an incumbent president. She used this occasion to express her belief that Saddam Hussein's government in Iraq contributed to circumstances that produced terrorism like the 9/11 attacks on America. Rice has also been a vocal supporter of political change in Cuba and in 2005 Fidel Castro referred to Rice as the "mad woman who talks of transition." Also in 2005, a series of negotiations with China, North Korea, South Korea, the United States, Russia, and Japan, resulted in North Korea withdrawing from talks after President Bush stated that North Korea's nuclear program must be dismantled.
In the following months, there was uncertainty over whether Rice could convince Kim Jong II to re-enter the negotiations, but in July 2005, North Korea announced that they had been convinced to return to the discussions. Condoleeza has been a constant vocal critic of Iran's human rights record and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's threatening statements toward Israel, and Iran’s pursuit of nuclear technology.
In mid-July 2006, when Hezbollah fighters from Lebanon launched rocket attacks into Israel, Secretary Rice immediately condemned the act, calling Hezbollah a "terrorist organization," and on that day, Rice was one of the first to speak directly to UN secretary general, Kofi Annan. In 2006 Rice was interviewed by Katie Couric where she discussed her experiences growing up as a child in Birmingham and her work as national security advisor and secretary of state for the Bush administration.
As secretary of state, Rice has visited nearly seventy countries and traveled several hundred thousand miles. Rice traveled more miles in her first year as secretary than her predecessor, Colin Powell did in his five-year career. It had been widely expected that Conoleeza Rice would run against Hillary Clinton as a candidate for the 2008 U.S. presidential elections. But more recently, Rice has stated her decision not to run.
To date Condoleeza rice remains unmarried.
YUDDY
