Elisabetta Belloni will leave the leadership of the Security Information Department, Dis, on January 15, after almost five years, ahead of the end of her mandate which was set for May. The news was confirmed to AGI by qualified sources. The 66-year-old Roman ambassador, who in 2016 became the first female secretary general of the Farnesina, was appointed to lead the Department that coordinates intelligence activities by the Draghi government in May 2021.
However, it has been denied that the resignation is linked to a role that Belloni is about to take on in Brussels alongside the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen.
The name of Elisabetta Belloni, the first woman to lead Italian intelligence, had circulated for the succession to Sergio Mattarella at the Quirinale, in January 2022, also due to the bipartisan appreciation she enjoys. She speaks four languages and was awarded the French Legion of Honour.
As a young woman she attended the Massimo high school in Rome, where Draghi also studied, after the Jesuits opened up to girls: “They taught us the commitment and rigor that accompany us throughout our lives”, she said. Graduated in 1982 in Political Science at Luiss in Rome, three years later she entered diplomacy. From 2004 to 2008 she directed the crisis unit of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and then was general director of development cooperation from 2008 to 2013.