Gulnora Islomovna Karimova is the eldest daughter of Uzbekistan's President, Islam Karimov. She was born born 8 July 1972.

In 1991, Karimova married Mansur Maqsudi, an American businessman of Afghan origin. They have two children, a son, Islam, born in 1992 and a daughter, Iman, born in 1998. When the marriage started to crumble in July 2001, Karimova took the two children and left the United States for Uzbekistan.

In 1998 and from 2000 to 2003 Karimova served as counselor at Uzbekistan's Mission to the United Nations in New York.[3] From 2003 until 2005 she was minister-counselor at the Uzbek embassy in Moscow, and served as adviser to the minister of foreign affairs from 2005 to 2008. In February 2008 she was appointed deputy foreign minister for international cooperation in cultural and humanitarian affairs. In September of the same year she became Permanent Representative of Uzbekistan to the United Nations and other international organizations in Geneva. In January 2010, she was named Uzbek Ambassador in Spain. She is a member of the Cercle Diplomatique de Genève.

Under Karimova's supervision five NGOs have been established in Uzbekistan. In 2009, two of the foundations, the Social Initiatives Support Fund (SISF) and the Women's Council Public Association, organized a conference on "Medical aspects and role of Public Organizations in breast cancer problems solutions".In 2006, under the SISF, Karimova took on initiative of micro-credits for women farmers in rural areas of Uzbekistan.

In March 2014, it was reported that Gulnara together with her 15 years-old daughter were being dragged from her apartment, it believed that her father is the one who made the order. According to uznews.net Ms Karimova's partner was arrested and beaten up. Ms Karimova tried to escape but was dragged back to the flat where she was beaten, it is alleged.

A letter suspected written by Gulnara itself was found, through the letter she claimed that she was beaten up, and treated worse than a dog. She also mentioned that she was naive back then, when she believes that law does exist.