Olev Olesk

Olev Olesk (born March 4, 1921 in Sooküla near Põlva , Estonia , † May 18, 2017 in New York City ) was an Estonian politician and foreign minister of the Estonian government-in-exile from 1990 to 1992 .

Life

Estonia

Olev Olesk was born the son of the farmer and local politician Johannes Olesk in Sooküla near Põlva , today Lasva municipality , Võru county , Estonia . Olev attended elementary school in Põlva and the Progymnasium in Tartu . He graduated from the teachers' college in Tartu in 1941 before studying law at the University of Tartu from 1942 to 1944 . In September 1944 he fled across the Baltic Sea from the Red Army and the Soviet occupation of Estonia to Sweden .

Sweden

From 1945 to 1951 Olev Olesk was a teacher at the Estonian elementary school in Stockholm , which he helped found. After that he devoted himself to banking. From 1951 to 1956 he worked at Svenska Handelsbanken before moving to New York City.

From 1956 to 1968 Olesk was employed by the Irving Trust, Company (ITC) , from 1968 to 1973 he was employed by The Bank of Tokyo Ltd. and from 1973 until his retirement in 1992 with Algemene Bank Nederland NV (ABN) .

politics

As early as 1951, Olev Olesk joined the Estonian exile movement in Sweden. Olesk was also a member of the Swedish Liberal People's Party . Educating the West about Soviet crimes was one of his main concerns.

In March 1986, Olev Olesk became a Minister without Portfolio in the Estonian government in exile. From June 20, 1990 to October 7, 1992 he was Foreign Minister of the Estonian government in exile. He then handed over his official duties to the first freely elected foreign minister of Estonia after the Second World War , Lennart Meri .

Web links

• CV (Estonian and English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ postimees.ee , accessed on May 20, 2017