Elena Kountoura

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Elena Kountoura in the European Parliament (2019)

Elena Kountoura , also Elena Koundoura , Greek Έλενα Κουντουρά (born November 2, 1962 in Athens ) is a Greek politician ( Nea Dimokratia until 2012, Anexartiti Ellines 2012-2019, Syriza since 2019). Kountara was Minister of Tourism under Alexis Tsipras from 2016 to 2019. Since the 2019 European elections , she has been a member of the European Parliament as part of the Confederal Group of the European United Left / Nordic Green Left . Before her political career, Kountoura worked as a model, head of a women's magazine and as an athlete.

Life

Youth and career as an athlete

Elena Kountoura was born on November 2, 1962 in Athens as the daughter of the former Greek army officer and monarchist Alexandros Kountouras. Kountoura has been athletics since childhood. At the age of twelve she started her training as a high jumper at the National Gymnastics Academy of Greece . At the educational institution she also completed her school career before studying at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens .

Kountoura was a top athlete for the Greek national athletics team and won the high jump and the 100-meter jump at the Panhellenic Women's Athletics Championship in 1978.

Activity as a model

She later changed her professional field and worked as an international model from 1984 to 1997. In 1990, the American television station CNN chose Kountoura as one of the ten most beautiful models in the world. For many years she worked with Serge Lutens , a well-known French photographer, designer and producer in the fashion world. She also worked with the Japanese cosmetics company Shiseido and was the “face” of the brand for many years.

Political career in Greece

In 1997 she returned to Greece, and from 2004 she headed a women's magazine. In the elections to the Greek parliament in 2004 , she ran for the conservative Nea Dimokratia and was elected to parliament for the constituency of Athens A. In the 2007 and 2009 elections she was unable to defend her mandate and only came second in each case, although she received more votes in 2007 than in 2004.

In November 2011, Kountoura moved into parliament after Dimitris Avramopoulos gave up his mandate to become a minister in the government of Loukas Papadimos . In February 2012 she voted in a parliamentary vote against the so-called "Second Memorandum" (second austerity package agreed between the Troika and the Greek government), and party leader Antonis Samaras then struck her off the list of candidates for the upcoming elections.

Because of this, Kountoura left the party and joined the Anexartiti Ellines (Independent Greeks). In the double elections in May and June 2012 , she was elected MP for the party in the Athens A constituency. In 2014 she took over the office of Chairperson of the Parliamentary Committee on Film and Cinema. As part of a cabinet reshuffle in November 2016, Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras appointed her to his government, she headed the Ministry of Tourism.

Election to the European Parliament

Kountoura (2019)

On January 14, 2019, she was expelled from her party, the Anexartiti Ellines, because of her continued support for the Tsipras government following the Prespa Accord that triggered the party's withdrawal from the ruling coalition. She then joined the Syriza. She nominated them for second place on the list in the 2019 European elections, after which she resigned from her position as minister.

Syriza won 23.7 percent in the elections, 6 of the 21 Greek mandates. Kountura won her mandate directly and joined the Confederal Group of the European United Left / Nordic Green Left together with her party colleagues . For the group, Kountura is a member of the Committee on Transport and Tourism , as well as an alternate member of the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy and the Committee on Women's Rights and Gender Equality .

Private

Kountoura's first marriage was to football player Michel Pineda . Her second marriage is to basketball player Sarantis Papachristopoulos , with whom she has two sons.

Web links

Commons : Elena Kountoura  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Μαρία Λεμονιά: Ελενα Κουντουρά: Νέο μοντέλο Τουρισμού. In: protothema.gr. February 4, 2015, accessed December 30, 2019 (Greek).
  2. ↑ a b c d e Τα δύο πρόσωπα της Ελενας Κουντουρά. June 11, 2014, accessed December 30, 2019 (Greek).
  3. ↑ Οι φωτογραφίες της Ελενας Κουντουρά όταν ήταν μούσα του κορυφαίου Serge Lutens [εικόνες & βίντεο]. In: iefimerida. May 23, 2013, accessed December 30, 2019 (Greek).
  4. ↑ Syriza's Failure Has Hurt Us All. Retrieved September 26, 2019 (American English).
  5. ↑ Greece's Tourism Minister Elena Kountoura Resigns to Run in European Elections. May 3, 2019, Retrieved December 30, 2019 (American English).
  6. ↑ Home | Elena KOUNTOURA | MPs | European Parliament. Accessed December 30, 2019 .
personal data
SURNAME Kountoura, Elena
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Koundoura, Elena
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Greek politician, former model and athlete; MEP
DATE OF BIRTH November 2nd, 1962
PLACE OF BIRTH Athens