Guntars Krasts

Guntars Krasts (2011)

Guntars Krasts (born October 16, 1957 in Riga ) is a Latvian politician . As a member of the Tēvzemei ​​un Brīvībai / LNNK ("For Fatherland and Freedom") party, he was Prime Minister of Latvia from 1997 to 1998 and a member of the European Parliament from 2004 to 2009 .

biography

Studies and professional career

After attending school, he studied economics at the University of Latvia , which he graduated in 1982. In the meantime, he also worked as an unskilled worker from 1976 to 1982. After completing his studies, he initially worked as a research assistant , then until 1991 as an economist at the University of Latvia. After Latvia gained independence on August 21, 1991, he was self-employed.

Start of political career

Krasts began his political career as a member of the national conservative Latvijas Nacionālās Neatkarības Kustība (LNNK, "Latvian National Independence Movement"), which merged in 1997 with Tēvzemei ​​un Brīvībai ("For Fatherland and Freedom") to form the TB / LNNK. In December 1995 it to the non-party prime minister appointed Andris Šķēle the economy minister .

Prime Minister (1997-98)

When Šķēle resigned on July 28, 1997, he was his successor as Prime Minister and confirmed on August 10, 1997 by Parliament ( Saeima ). Like his predecessor, Krasts headed a “ rainbow coalition ” made up of the TB / LNNK, the liberal LC , farmers' union , Christian Democrats and the left-liberal / populist DPS (the latter left the government in April 1998 due to disagreements over foreign policy). After he had dismissed Defense Minister Tālavs Jundzis on October 27, 1998 , he temporarily took over his office. Krast's term as prime minister ended on November 26, 1998.

Member of the Saeima and the European Parliament

From 1998 to 2004 Krasts was a board member of the TB / LNNK. In the October 1998 election he won a seat in the Latvian parliament Saeima . There he was chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee during the legislative period from 1998 to 2002 . At the same time he was Deputy Prime Minister in the government of his successor Vilis Krištopans ( LC ) from November 26, 1998 to July 16, 1999, responsible for relations with the European Union , whose candidate country was Latvia. In the third cabinet of Šķēle (from July 1999) Krasts was no longer represented. In the parliamentary elections in 2002 he was re-elected, despite heavy losses from the TB / LNNK. Parliament then elected him Chairman of the Committee on European Affairs .

Before Latvia joined the European Union on May 1, 2004, he was an observer of the Saeima in the European Parliament for a few months . In the European elections in June 2004 , he was elected to one of the nine members of Latvia in the European Parliament, where he belongs to the right-wing conservative parliamentary group Union for a Europe of Nations . Krasts also became deputy chairman of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs (ECON). In June 2008 he resigned from the TB / LNNK. The following year he was nominated as the top candidate of the new Eurosceptic Libertas party in Latvia. However, this failed in the European elections in 2009 with 4.3% of the entry hurdle, so that Krasts left the European Parliament.

Web links

• Entry on Guntars Krasts in the European Parliament 's database of representatives

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Information in rulers.org
2. ↑ Information in rulers.org
3. ↑ Thomas Schmidt: The Latvian Saeima between continuity and change. In: Susanne Kraatz, Silvia von Steinsdorff: Parliaments and system transformation in post-socialist Europe. Leske + Budrich, Opladen 2002, pp. 220–246, on p. 240.
4. ^ Entry on Guntars Krasts in the European Parliament 's database of representatives

predecessor	Office	successor
Andris Šķēle	Prime Minister of Latvia August 7, 1997 - November 26, 1998	Vilis Krištopans