Stavros Lambrinidis

Stavros Lambrinidis (Greek: Σταύρος Λαμπρινίδης; born 6 February 1962) is a Greek lawyer and politician who has served as the Ambassador of the European Union to the United States since March 2019.[1] He previously served as the European Union Special Representative for Human Rights from 2012 to 2019 and Minister for Foreign Affairs from June 2011 to November 2011.

Stavros Lambrinidis
Σταύρος Λαμπρινίδης
Ambassador of the European Union to the United States
Assumed office
4 March 2019
PresidentJean-Claude Juncker
Preceded byDavid O'Sullivan
European Union Special Representative for Human Rights
In office
25 July 2012 – 20 February 2019
PresidentJosé Manuel Barroso
Jean-Claude Juncker
Preceded byNew office
Succeeded byEamon Gilmore
Minister of Foreign Affairs
In office
17 June 2011 – 11 November 2011
Prime MinisterGeorge Papandreou
Preceded byDimitrios Droutsas
Succeeded byStavros Dimas
3rd Vice-President of the European Parliament
In office
14 July 2009 – 17 January 2012
PresidentJerzy Buzek
Preceded byGérard Onesta
Succeeded byAnni Podimata
Member of the European Parliament
In office
20 June 2004 – 16 June 2011
ConstituencyGreece
Personal details
Born (1962-02-06) 6 February 1962
Athens, Kingdom of Greece
Political partyPASOK
Spouse(s)
Phoebe Capuanou
(
m. 1989)
Children4
Alma mater
WebsiteOfficial website

Early life

Lambrinidis was born in Athens on 6 February 1962. After graduating from the Athens College high school, Lambrinidis was admitted to the University of Chicago in 1980 and transferred to Amherst College in 1981, where he received his B.A. degree in economics and political science with the distinctions of Magna Cum Laude, Phi Beta Kappa and a scholarship for the rest of his studies. He completed his education in 1988, with a J.D. degree from Yale Law School.

At Yale University he worked as a Teaching Assistant in the School of Organization and Management, as well as the Managing Editor of The Yale Journal of International Law.[2]

Early career
Foreign Minister's Stavros Lambrinidis interview on BBC News in October 2011

He trained in International Trade, Transactions and Arbitration,[3] as a colleague of Lloyd Cutler[4] (founder of Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering in Washington, D.C. and law advisor of the White House during Jimmy Carter's and Bill Clinton's Presidencies). He also served as president of the Committee for Human Rights in the Bar Association of Washington, D.C..

His career in Greece, started in 1994 as a special advisor to former Prime Minister of Greece and President of the Socialist International George A. Papandreou and continued as the chief-of-staff of the Minister of Foreign Affairs during Theodoros Pangalos's post in the ministry in 1996. Between 1996 and 1999, he was Secretary General of the Greek foreign affairs ministry responsible for Diaspora Greeks. He subsequently became an Ambassador at Large of the Hellenic Republic and, in 2000, the Director General of the International Olympic Truce Center (International Olympic Committee organization).

During this period, he was a visiting Lecturer at the International Olympic Academy in Athens as well as a lecturer in the Diplomatic and Police Academies of Greece. He was also a guest speaker in the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland in the years 2003 and 2004.[5]

European Parliament

European Union Special Representative Stavros Lambrinidis started his career in the European Parliament on 20 July 2004,[6] as a Member of the European Parliament for the Greek Social Democratic Party PA.SO.K.. A few months later he was elected as the Vice President of the Party of European Socialists and in April 2005, as head of the Parliamentary delegation of Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PA.SO.K.) to the European Parliament.

During this term, he served as a Vice President of the Parliament's Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE),[7] as a Member of the Delegation of Relations with the United States,[8] as well as a Substitute-Member of the Delegation of Relations with Iran and the Committee of the Constitutional Affairs.

In July 2009, he was elected as a Vice President of the European Parliament,[9] while in November 2010, he was a speaker of the European Data Protection and Privacy Conference.[10]

As a popular politician, with a large experience in the diplomatic field, international trade, foreign relations and a political instinct, in 2012 European Union Special Representative Stavros Lambrinidis was reckoned as the leading candidate for the position of United Nations Under Secretary General for Public Information before the assumption of his European Union duties.[11]

Minister for Foreign Affairs
Foreign Minister of Greece, Stavros Lambrinidis, with U.S. Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton joint press conference State Department October 2011
Greek Foreign Minister Lambrinidis with Egyptian Foreign Minister, Mohamed Kamel Amr during official 2011 visit to Cairo

Following a cabinet reshuffle that took place on 17 June 2011 in Athens, Greece, Prime Minister George A. Papandreou announced Stavros Lambrinidis as the new Minister for Foreign Affairs of Greece.

A month after the assignment of his new post, he signed a Cultural Memorandum of Understanding with the U.S. Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, on import restrictions for archaeological finds between the U.S. and Greece, in order to combat the illegal trade of Greek antiquities that have frequently turned up in foreign museums.[12]

As Foreign Affairs Minister of the Hellenic Republic he visited numerous European countries,[13] to explain the effectiveness of the reforms taking place in Greece and the investment opportunities in the country.[14] During his public engagements, he also made a number of proposals about the establishment of new international instruments to tackle economic inequalities and to generate funds for economic development projects, such as the financial transactions tax, and new political and economic governance instruments that would make the European Union more united, in order to be able to prevent and tackle more effectively future financial crises.[15]

In September 2011, he represented Greece on the 66th General Assembly of the United Nations,[16] while a few days later he was the keynote speaker in the World Leadership Forum,[17] which is annually organized by the Foreign Policy Association.

E.U.S.R. Stavros Lambrinidis was succeeded by M.P. Stavros Dimas in November 2011, after an agreement between the parties that participated in the Coalition Government.

Special representative
Stavros Lambrinidis interview at the Kudlow Report CNBC
Stavros Lambrinidis in an interview at Citi FM during his visit to Ghana in July 2017 on human rights and democracy.

A long-standing request[18] for a representative that would be in charge of enhancing the effectiveness and visibility of E.U.'s Human Rights policy, based on the Strategic Framework and Action Plan on Human Rights and Democracy (officially adopted on 25 June 2012),[19] led to the creation of the post of the Special Representative of the European Union for Human Rights . The post which is providing a strong, independent, flexible and sufficiently broad mandate, is aimed at increasing the European Union's effectiveness, coherence, and visibility in protecting and promoting human rights in the EU's foreign policy. It covers fields such as the strengthening of all Human rights, Democracy, International Justice, Humanitarian Law, anti-discrimination, and the abolition of the death penalty.

On 25 July 2012, the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Baroness Ashton of Upholland, appointed him as the first European Union's Special Representative for Human Rights, with a renewable two years mandate.[20]

During his mandate he has paid official visits for meetings with governments and civil society in numerous countries around the world, including China,[21] Cuba,[22] Myanmar,[23] Bahrain,[24] Pakistan,[25] Indonesia, Brazil, Mexico[26] Morocco, South Africa,[27] Azerbaijan,[28] Russia, Norway, Belarus,[29] the United States, and the United Nations in Geneva and New York. His work has been praised by European Union Foreign Affairs Ministers and the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini.[30]

Ambassadorship to the United States
Lambrinidis speaks at the White House in 2019

On 4 March 2019, Lambrinidis assumed the post of EU Ambassador to the United States. On the day of his ascension, the EU Delegation to the United States was raised in the U.S. Diplomatic Corps' Order of Precedence. The Trump Administration had previously lowered the delegation's protocol status to that of international organisations, a tier below the highest level - usually reserved for countries.[31] As a result, Lambrinidis per protocol holds the rank equivalent of Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to the United States of America.

Awards and distinctions
  • Emeritus Professor at the Mariupol Institute of Humanities of the Donetsk National University in Donetsk Oblast, Ukraine
  • Hellenic Leadership Conference, for his work in the promotion of Hellenic perspectives abroad
  • M.E.P. Candidate of the Year 2006
  • Former President of the District of Columbia Bar Association's Human Rights Committee
  • Board Member of the American Bar Association's Trade Committee
  • Editor of the A.B.A. International Trade Newsletter[32]

Publications
  • "Integration of Immigrants into the E.U." - European Parliament's Reports
  • "Promoting Security and Fundamental Rights in the Electronic Age" - European Parliament's Reports

See also

References
  1. "Immediate Change to the EU Delegation to the United States' Protocol Status". U.S. Mission to the European Union. 2019-03-04. Retrieved 2019-06-19.
  2. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2016-09-11. Retrieved 2016-07-24.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  3. "Foreign Policy Association". www.fpa.org.
  4. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2012-03-29. Retrieved 2011-10-14.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  5. ":: Chinese Olympic Committee ::". en.olympic.cn. Retrieved 2019-06-19.
  6. "List of all current and former Members - MEPs - European Parliament". www.europarl.europa.eu.
  7. Ireland, Data Protection Commissioner of. "European Data Protection Authorities Workshop on Passenger Data - Data Protection Commissioner - Ireland". www.dataprotection.ie.
  8. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2012-07-12. Retrieved 2011-10-15.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  9. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2011-08-07. Retrieved 2011-10-14.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  10. "The European Data Protection and Privacy Conference - Speaker Biographies". www.eu-ems.com.
  11. "Inner City Press: Investigative Reporting from the United Nations". www.innercitypress.com.
  12. Staff, By the CNN Wire. "Clinton praises 'vital' austerity measures in Greece". Retrieved 2017-01-11.
  13. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2012-04-03. Retrieved 2011-10-14.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  14. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/europe/EU-values-under-strain-in-crisis-Greek-foreign-minister/articleshow/9290957.cms
  15. "EU Is Developing Economic Governance, Greece's Lambrinidis Says". 21 September 2011 – via www.bloomberg.com.
  16. "Foreign Minister Stavros Lambrinidis Concludes Meetings at UN General Assembly - USA.GreekReporter.com". 26 September 2011.
  17. "Foreign Policy Association". www.fpa.org.
  18. http://www.theparliament.com/latest-news/article/newsarticle/former-mep-chosen-as-eus-new-human-rights-envoy/#.UBJekNnOQrA
  19. "EU appoints Human Rights chief". 26 July 2012.
  20. "EU Special Representatives - EEAS - European External Action Service - European Commission". EEAS - European External Action Service.
  21. "EU Special Representative for Human Rights visits China - EEAS - European External Action Service - European Commission". EEAS - European External Action Service.
  22. "EU-Cuba Human Rights Dialogue in Havana - EEAS - European External Action Service - European Commission". EEAS - European External Action Service.
  23. "3rd Myanmar-EU Human Rights Dialogue - EEAS - European External Action Service - European Commission". EEAS - European External Action Service.
  24. "Bahrain Weekly Update: U.S. Ambassador, Congressional Delegation Meet with Officials; E.U. Rights Rep Visits Bahrain - Project on Middle East Democracy (POMED)". pomed.org.
  25. http://eeas.europa.eu/archives/delegations/pakistan/documents/press_corner/20141029_03_en.pdf
  26. "Is Egypt on the road to democracy? EU human rights representative meets 30 rights advocates and lawyers - EuroMed Rights".
  27. "Foundation for Human Rights :: Visit of EU Special Representative for Human Rights". www.fhr.org.za. Retrieved 2019-08-13.
  28. "President Aliyev meets EU rep. for human rights". 24 February 2015.
  29. "EU Special Representative for Human Rights Stavros Lambrinidis visits Minsk". www.tvr.by.
  30. "Council adopts new EU action plan on human rights and democracy, "Keeping human rights at the heart of the EU agenda" - Consilium". www.consilium.europa.eu.
  31. Emma Anderson (2019-03-04). "US bumps EU diplomatic status back up after downgrade". POLITICO. Retrieved 2019-06-19.
  32. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2011-08-22. Retrieved 2012-04-17.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
Political offices
Preceded by
Dimitrios Droutsas		 Minister for Foreign Affairs
2011		 Succeeded by
Stavros Dimas
Diplomatic posts
New office European Union Special Representative for Human Rights
2012–present		 Incumbent
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