UN Women`s chief Michelle Bachelet has decided to step down, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon confirmed in a statement issued here late Friday.

"Ms. Michelle Bachelet has informed me of her intention to step down as executive director of UN Women," Ban said in the statement issued by his spokesman.

Widely predicted as a possible Chilean presidential candidate in 2014, Bachelet apparently has an eye on the job.

Bachelet, the former Chilean president, is the first UN under-secretary-general and executive director of UN Women, which was established on July 2, 2010 by the United Nations General Assembly.

Bachelet, who was born in Santiago on Sept. 29, 1951, is a pediatrician and public health expert.

The resignation apparently takes place immediately since there was no effective date.

UN Women brought together a variety of UN agencies and departments and consolidated them under one roof. The agency bills itself as the UN "entity for gender equality and the empowerment of women."

"I would like to express my tremendous gratitude for her outstanding service," Ban said of Bachelet, who took up her pioneering position at UN headquarters in 2010. "Michelle Bachelet was the right person in the right job at the right time."

Bachelet recently topped a poll in Chile of possible presidential candidates in the South American country, but when asked about her intentions to join the race, she said, "We`ll talk in March," the Santiago Times reported in January.

The resignation announcement came shortly after Ban said in a separate statement to welcome the outcome of the 57th session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) and an agreement reached on the prevention and elimination of all forms of violence against women and girls.

Source: ANTARA