FACTBOX: Who is Carla Del Ponte?

(Reuters) - U.N. prosecutor Carla del Ponte is about to bow out after eight years as the world's most powerful criminal lawyer.

Del Ponte helped the U.N. war crimes tribunal for the former Yugoslavia bring scores of suspects to court and became a champion of victims seeking justice.

Here are key details on Del Ponte.

* ROAD TO YUGOSLAVIA:

-- Born in Lugano on February 9, 1947, Del Ponte learned English in London before studying law in Berne and Geneva. She started a law career in her home town in 1975.

-- She became an investigating magistrate in 1981 and later joined the public prosecutor's office in Lugano. Del Ponte forged close links with Italian anti-Mafia judges like Giovanni Falcone and escaped a Sicily bomb attempt in 1989 while working with him. The Mafia blew up Falcone in 1992.

-- She took shooting lessons after Falcone was killed, but vowed never to carry a gun. She became Switzerland's top prosecutor in 1994, chasing the dirty money of cocaine cartels and indicting former Pakistan PM Benazir Bhutto for money laundering. She also froze assets of Italian suspects, including former Prime Minister Bettino Craxi.

* INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL TRIBUNAL:

-- Del Ponte's style has not been to everyone's taste. Colleagues at the International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia went misty-eyed at the mention of her predecessor, Canadian Louise Arbour, from whom she took over in September 1999.

-- Where Arbour was a master of diplomatic persuasion, Del Ponte's from-the-hip salvoes ignore subtle political realities, some insiders have said.

-- Of the 161 people the court has indicted only four remain at large, two of them -- Bosnian Serb wartime leader Radovan Karadzic and his military chief Ratko Mladic -- are accused of genocide.

-- The high point for Del Ponte was the arrest of former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. His death in custody in 2006 before a verdict was her biggest defeat.

(Writing by David Cutler, London Editorial Reference Unit)