Karel Van Miert

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Karel Van Miert

Karel ALH Van Miert (born January 17, 1942 in Oud-Turnhout , † June 22, 2009 in Beersel ) was a Belgian politician .

Life

Coming from a farming family, he was given the university entrance qualification to study at Ghent University from 1962 . Four years later he graduated with a licentiate in diplomatic sciences. After an internship at the European Commission in 1967/68, he attended summer courses at Worcester College in Oxford .

When the Prague Spring was crushed in August 1968, he was in Prague and was able to return to Belgium by train via West Berlin just in time . In 1971 he became an aspirant in the NFWO science fund as an employee of the Dutch Sicco Mansholt , then European Commissioner for Agriculture. In 1976 he was head of cabinet at the Belgian Minister of Economic Affairs, Willy Claes , who also appointed him Vice Secretary-General of the then Belgian Workers' Party .

Van Miert was chairman of the Flemish Socialists from 1978 to 1988 . From 1979 to 1985 he was a member of the European Parliament and from 1986 to 1992 deputy chairman of the Socialist International .

Van Miert was EU Commissioner from 1989 to 1999 . In the German and Austrian public he was best known as the EU Commissioner for Transport and Competition who wanted to ban fixed book prices at the end of the 1990s . During his time as Commissioner, the Boeing / McDonell Douglas merger project (Case No. IV / M.877), which was initially assessed differently by the competition authorities in the EU and the USA, and was finally approved. In his autobiography he described the massive pressure exerted by the US administration.

As traffic commissioner, Van Miert was the main point of contact for the Austrian government at the time for all transit issues. First of all, in 1989 there were exceptions to the night driving ban for trucks in Austria. In 1992, he reached an agreement with Austria's Transport Minister Viktor Klima on the transit contract , which regulates the number of passages and the calculation of “eco-points” for trucks from the European Community.

Karel Van Miert then worked at the Dutch University of Economics in Nyenrode . Karel Van Miert continued to work for the EU even after leaving the EU Commission. He was the coordinator of TEN project no. 1 including the Brenner base tunnel and was also responsible for satellite issues ( GALILEO project ).

As EU coordinator TEN project no. 1, he signed a memorandum of understanding on the expansion of the Brenner railway line in Rome on May 18, 2009 together with the transport ministers from Germany, Austria and Italy .

On June 22, 2009, van Miert suffered a fatal heart attack in his garden. At the request of the family, the minister of state did not receive an appropriate burial; the cremation took place with relatives and friends.

From July 17, 2002 until his death he was a member of the Supervisory Board of Munich Re . The Munich District Court appointed Benita Ferrero-Waldner to be his successor, who was confirmed in office at the Annual General Meeting on April 28, 2010.

Awards

Fonts

  • Market, power, competition. My experience as a commissioner in Brussels , DVA, Stuttgart 2000, ISBN 3-421-05384-7

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Decision of the Commission of July 30, 1997 on the compatibility of a concentration with the common market and the EEA Agreement, Case No. IV / M.877 - Boeing / McDonnell Douglas. (PDF; 3.34 MB) Retrieved April 17, 2019 .
  2. ↑ Karel Van Miert: Market Power Competition . 2000, ISBN 3-421-05384-7 , pp. 292 .
  3. ↑ Munich Re: Annual Report of the Munich Re Group 2002. Accessed on July 27, 2018 .
  4. ↑ Benita Ferrero-Waldner appointed to the Munich Re Supervisory Board. Retrieved July 27, 2018 .
  5. ↑ List of all decorations awarded by the Federal President for services to the Republic of Austria from 1952 (PDF; 6.9 MB)
  6. ↑ UNIFE: European Railway Award 2007. Europe's rail sector honors key players ( English ) October 17, 2007. Archived from the original on December 3, 2013. Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved June 19, 2010. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.unife.org

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Van Miert, Karel
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Van Miert, Karel ALH
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Belgian politician, MEP
DATE OF BIRTH January 17, 1942
PLACE OF BIRTH Oud turnhout
DATE OF DEATH June 22, 2009
Place of death Beersel