South Korean President-elect Park Geun-Hye, of the ruling Saenuri Party, waves to supporters after she is declared the winner of the presidential elections on Dec. 19, 2012 in Seoul, South Korea. Park, daughter of former president Park Chung-Hee, becomes the first female president of South Korea.
- [Lee Young-Ho-pool/AFP/Getty Images]

Indira Gandhi served as India's first female prime minister from 1966 to 1977, and then again from 1980 until 1984. The world's longest serving female prime minister to date, Gandhi became famous for her slogan, "garibi hatao," or "eradicate poverty." But she is also known for the Emergency which she declared in 1975, one of the most controversial periods in Indian history. Gandhi was assassinated in 1984.
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Golda Meir served as the first woman prime minister of Israel in 1969. She led the country through the Yom Kippur War in 1973 and remains the only female to head the state of Israel to date.
- [AFP/Getty Images]

Maria Estela Isabel Martinez de Peron, commonly known as Isabel Peron was Argentina's first female president who took over in 1974, after the death of her husband Juan Peron. Her presidency lasted until 1976 when she was deposed, arrested and eventually exiled by a military junta.
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Benazir Bhutto served twice as the prime minister of Pakistan, from 1988 to 1990, and again from 1993 to 1996. She was the first elected woman to lead a Muslim state. In addition to facing corruption charges, she spent eight years in exile when the country was at the hands of the military dictatorship. Upon returning to Pakistan, she was assassinated during a campaign rally for her party on Dec. 27, 2007.
- [Warrick Page/AFP/Getty Images]

Margaret Thatcher, now known as the 'Iron Lady,' was elected in 1979 as the United Kingdom's first female prime minister until 1990.
- [Oli Scarff/AFP/Getty Images]

Ellen John Sirleaf, former finance minister of Liberia, was elected as the country's first female president in 2006. She is also Africa's first elected woman head of state.
- [John Macdougall/AFP/Getty Images]

Johanna Sigurdardottir, current and first female prime minister of Iceland, was elected in 2009. She is also the first openly homosexual head of state.
- [Halldor Kolbeins/AFP/Getty Images]

Dilma Rousseff became the first female president of Brazil in January 2011. She previously served as Energy Minister under President Lula, and later became his chief of staff.
- [Evaristo Sa/AFP/Getty Images]

Yingluck Shinawatra shakes hands with supporters after speaking at a campaign rally on June 29, 2011, in Sisaket, Thailand.
- [Paula Bronstein/AFP/Getty Images]

Sriramavo Bandaranaike became the world's first elected woman prime minister in 1960 in Sri Lanka in the wake of her husband's assassination. She can be seen in this picture, the only female leader amid key political figures in the 1961 conference of the unaligned countries that took place in what was then Belgrade, Yugoslavia.
- [AFP/Getty Images]

Argentine President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner waves after casting her vote at a polling station, on Oct. 23, 2011.
- [Juan Mabromata/AFP/Getty Images]

German Federal Chancellor Angela Merkel arrives for a press conference at the end of a two-day European Union summit on March 2, 2012 at the EU headquarters in Brussels.
- [Lionel Bonaventure/AFP/Getty Images]

Myanmar's democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi shares a moment alongside US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during a press conference after their meeting at Suu Kyi's residence laying out a framework for reforms on December 2nd, 2011 in Yangon, Myanmar. The pace of change in Myanmar brought Clinton's visit which is the first by a top Western diplomat in over a half a century.
- [Paula Bronstein/AFP/Getty Images]

In this photograph taken on October 2, 2011, chairperson of India's Congress-led UPA government Sonia Gandhi looks on after paying her respects at the memorial to the father of the Nation Mahatma Gandhi at Rajghat in New Delhi, in honour of Gandhi's 143rd birth anniversary.
- [RAVEENDRAN/AFP/Getty Images]

Mother Teresa hugs a child in West Beirut on August 15, 1982.
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Costa Rican President Laura Chinchilla speaks in front of International Labor Organization (ILO) Director-General Juan Somavia (L) on May 30, 2012, during the opening of the 101th annual conference of the ILO at United Nations offices in Geneva.
- [Fabrice Coffrini/AFP/Getty Images]

(L-R) Former prime minister of Norway Gro Brundtland, chairman of the Elders archbishop Desmond Tutu, founder of India's self-employed women's association (SEWA) Ela Bhatt and former president of Ireland Mary Robinson pose for photographers after a joint press conference in New Delhi on February 9, 2012.
- [SAJJAD HUSSAIN/AFP/Getty Images]