Haya bint Hussein

Princess Haya bint Al Hussein (الأميرة هيا بنت الحسين; born 3 May 1974) is the daughter of King Hussein of Jordan and his third wife, Queen Alia.

She is the half-sister of King Abdullah II.

Haya is a graduate of the University of Oxford in England and an accomplished equestrian.

She has a younger brother, Prince Ali bin Hussein born on 23 December 1975, and older sister, Abir Muhaisen (born 1973), the latter of whom was adopted by Haya's parents after her biological mother was killed by a plane crash at their Palestinian refugee camp in Amman.

In 1977, when Haya was 3 years old, her mother died in a helicopter crash.

She was educated in the United Kingdom, where in 1985, she attended Badminton School in Bristol, and later the Bryanston School in Dorset.

In 1992, she took the bronze medal in individual Jumping at the seventh Pan Arab Games in Damascus, Syria, and in 1993 was named Jordan's athlete of the year.

Princess Haya was the first woman to represent her native Jordan in international equestrian sport and the only woman to win a medal in the Pan-Arab Equestrian Games.

From 1993 to 1995, she was enrolled at St Hilda's College, Oxford, from which she graduated with a BA honours degree in philosophy, politics, and economics (PPE).

Princess Haya began horse riding internationally when she was 13.

Her father died from complications related to non-Hodgkin's lymphoma in 1999, leaving the crown to her half-brother, King Abdullah II.

She represented Jordan at the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney and is the two-term President of the International Federation for Equestrian Sports (FEI).

Having trained for several years in Ireland and Germany, she qualified for the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney representing Jordan in show jumping, where she was also her country's flag bearer.

Princess Haya participated in the 2002 FEI World Equestrian Games at Jerez de la Frontera in Spain, and represented Jordan at the FEI General Assembly on several occasions.

In 2004, Haya became the second official wife of the ruler of the Emirate of Dubai, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum.

They had two children, Sheikha Jalila and Sheikh Zayed.

She was elected president of the International Federation for Equestrian Sports (FEI) in 2006 for an initial four-year term in the FEI's first contested presidential race.

In 2007, Princess Haya became a member of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), and in 2010 became an appointee to the IOC's International Relations Committee, and has also served on the IOC Athletes' and Culture and Olympic Education Commissions.

After being named the European champion 2-year-old in 2007 and winning the 2008 Epsom Derby, New Approach was retired at the end of the 2008 racing season.

Princess Haya is the first Arab and first woman to become Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations World Food Programme and UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon appointed her a UN Messenger of Peace in 2007.

She founded Tkiyet Um Ali (TUA), the first Arab NGO dedicated to overcoming local hunger, in her native Jordan, which provides food assistance and employment opportunities to thousands of poor families.

On 7 June 2008, New Approach, a three-year-old colt owned by Princess Haya, trained in Ireland by Jim Bolger and ridden by Kevin Manning, won the Derby Stakes.

On 25 October 2008, her three-year-old colt, Raven's Pass, won the $5 million Breeders' Cup Classic.

In 2009, due to her contribution to the equine world, she was made the first Patron of Retraining of Racehorses.

Princess Haya serves as president of the International Jordanian Athletes Cultural Association, which she founded to provide athletes with needed national incentive and support.

Nonetheless, during the FEI's campaign to eliminate doping and horse abuse in equestrian sport, Princess Haya's husband and stepson were both convicted by the FEI in 2009 for serious doping violations.

Princess Haya ceded presidential powers to a senior colleague for the FEI disciplinary processes on the matter.

She later complained that the issue would be used to "injure and damage the reputations of myself and my family".

Princess Haya frequently appeared, along with her husband, at Royal Ascot, the Epsom Derby and other highlights of the English equestrian calendar; both were reported to have been friendly with Queen Elizabeth II.

Ten UN agencies and nearly 40 non-government organizations are members of the IHC which has supported relief efforts all over the globe, including for Syrian refugees affected by civil war, for East Africans during the last drought, in Pakistan during the 2009 floods, and to Afghanistan and Yemen.

In 2010, she became the first sitting FEI president to be challenged in a re-election bid.

She succeeded, however, in winning a second and final four-year term, receiving 75 percent of the vote to soundly defeat her two European rivals.

In November 2012, Tkiyet Um Ali announced a campaign to quadruple the number of its beneficiaries to reach 20,000 families living under the food poverty line, aiming to meet the UN Millennium Development Goals on hunger by 2015.

Tkiyet Um Ali (TUA) is intended to expand to reach all Jordanian families with insufficient income to meet basic food needs.

In addition, Dar Abu Abdullah (DAA) and TUA announced a strategic partnership for a parallel jobs creation program to help TUA beneficiaries become more self-sufficient.

Princess Haya chaired Dubai's International Humanitarian City which is the world's largest operational center for the delivery of aid, both in emergencies and for long-term development.

In 2019, Haya and Mohammed divorced, and she left Dubai with her children to reside in the United Kingdom.

Legal proceedings between Haya and Mohammed before the High Court over custody of their children attracted considerable media attention.

On 5 March 2020, a British court ruled that on the balance of probabilities, Sheikh Mohammed, the absolute ruler of Dubai and the prime minister of the UAE, had abducted two of his daughters, Shamsa and Latifa, and had threatened Haya.

Princess Haya was born in Amman, the capital of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, the daughter of King Hussein and his third wife, Queen Alia.