Claire Diao is a French-Burkinabè film critic and distributor. She founded the short film program Quartiers Lointains in 2013, co-founded the Pan-African film critic magazine AWOTELE in 2015, and has been the CEO of the Pan-African film distribution company Sudu Connexion since 2016. In 2018, Diao received the Beaumarchais Medal from the French Society of Dramatic Authors and Composers for her essay Double Vague, le nouveau souffle du cinéma français (Au Diable Vauvert, ed. 2017). As a TV host, she worked for Canal + International and France O and as a columist, for Canal+ and TV5 Monde. Claire Diao is a member of the African Film Critic Federation, the Burkinabè Film Critic organization and collaborate with the Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival and Durban Talents (South Africa). In 2018, she joined the Cannes Directors’ Fortnight official selection committee and in 2022, the FESPACO selection committee.