“People take their voices to the streets when they are not heard by their governments. If we want stability in the region, we must build institutions of civil society so people can channel their demands through these institutions. If we want prosperity in the region we must invest in young people through encouraging enterprise.
The Princess has inaugurated the Alwaleed Bin Talal Village Orphanage in Burkina Faso and traveled to Pakistan to provide aid and relief to the country's flood victims and to support education. Together with Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, Princess Ameera also formally opened the Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Centre of Islamic Studies at the University of Cambridge, where she accepted, from Prince Philip, an 800th Anniversary Medal for Outstanding Philanthropy. Most recently she has spearheaded a relief mission to Somalia, where she and her ex-husband, Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, oversaw the distribution of Foundation-sponsored aid.
Al-Taweel was born in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Her father is Aidan bin Nayef Al-Taweel Al-Otaibi. She was raised by her divorced mother and her grandparents in Riyadh. At age 18 she met Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal, a man 28 years older than her, while conducting an interview for a school paper. Eventually, they married in 2008 and were later divorced in November 2013. Princess Ameera is a magna cum laude graduate of the University of New Haven with a degree in Business Administration.
In 2011, Princess Ameera received the ITP Special "Humanitarian Award" on behalf of the Alwaleed Bin Talal Foundation at the Arabian Business Achievement Awards ceremony. She was the most high-profile newcomer to the CEO Middle East 100 Most Powerful Arab Women 2012 list with a fourth-place ranking. She also received the Woman Personality of the Year Award from the Middle East Excellence Award Institute.
