Heiko Maas | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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 Maas in 2019 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Federal Minister of Foreign Affairs | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| In office 14 March 2018 – 8 December 2021 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Chancellor | Angela Merkel | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Preceded by | Sigmar Gabriel | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Succeeded by | Annalena Baerbock | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| President of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| In office 18 November 2020 – 21 May 2021 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Preceded by | Nikos Dendias | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Succeeded by | Péter Szijjártó | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Federal Minister of Justice and Consumer Protection | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| In office 17 December 2013 – 14 March 2018 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Chancellor | Angela Merkel | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Preceded by | Sabine Leutheusser- Schnarrenberger (Justice) Ilse Aigner (Consumer Protection) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Succeeded by | Katarina Barley | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Member of theBundestag forSaarland | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| In office 26 October 2021 – 16 December 2022 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Preceded by | Peter Altmaier | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Succeeded by | Emily Vontz | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Constituency | Saarlouis | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| In office 24 September 2017 – 26 October 2021 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Constituency | SPD state-wide list | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Member of theLandtag of Saarland | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| In office 16 October 1994 – 17 December 2013 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Personal details | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Born | Heiko Josef Maas (1966-09-19)19 September 1966 (age 59) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Party | Social Democratic Party | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Domestic partner | Natalia Wörner[1] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Alma mater | Saarland University | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Heiko Josef Maas (German pronunciation:[ˈhaɪkoːˈjoːzɛfˈmaːs]; born 19 September 1966) is a German lawyer[2] and former politician of theSocial Democratic Party (SPD) who served as theFederal Minister of Foreign Affairs (2018–2021) and as theFederal Minister of Justice and Consumer Protection (2013–2018) in thecabinet ofChancellorAngela Merkel.[3] Since 2022, he has been practicing as a lawyer.[2]
Maas was born inSaarlouis to a Catholic family, and is a lawyer. Before his appointment to the federal cabinet he was active in state politics inSaarland, where he served as Minister of the Environment, Energy and Transport (1998–1999), Minister of Economy, Labor, Energy and Transport (2012–2013) and DeputyMinister-President (2012–2013).[4]
Maas was born on 19 September 1966 to a Catholic, middle class family inSaarlouis, a city near the French border that is named forLouis XIV of France. His father was a professional soldier who later became a manager atSaarlouis Body & Assembly, a car plant owned byFord Germany, while his mother was a dressmaker.[4] He graduated from thegymnasium in 1987 and served his compulsory military service from 1987 to 1988; he thereafter worked for a year at Saarlouis Body & Assembly. From 1989 he studied law atSaarland University, and he passed his first state examination in 1993 and was called to the bar in 1996.[5]
Maas was first elected to the Saarland Parliament in the1994 Saarland state election, under the mentorship ofOskar Lafontaine who would later (March 1999) leave the Social Democrats to found his own party.[4][6] He served as Minister of the Environment, Energy and Transport from 9 November 1998 to 29September 1999 (Klimmt cabinet).
Maas led the SPD into the2009 state election, in which his party only gained 24.5 percent, the party’s worst election result in the state.
Maas was an SPD delegate to theFederal Convention for the purpose of electing thePresident of Germany in 2010 and 2012.
After the2012 state election, the SPD went into coalition with theCDU,[7] which before that election had been governing the state in coalition with the Green Party and the Liberals.[8] While the Social Democrats andLeft had won enough seats to form a coalition, Maas ruled out such an alliance in favor of a coalition with the CDU led by incumbentMinister-PresidentAnnegret Kramp-Karrenbauer.[9] As deputy minister-president, he took over responsibility for the economy,[10] transport, and employment.[11]
Following the2013 federal elections, Maas was part of the SPD team in the negotiations with the CDU/CSU on a coalition agreement; he was a member of the energy policy working group led byPeter Altmaier andHannelore Kraft. On 17 December 2013, he was sworn in as theMinister of Justice and Consumer Protection in thethird cabinet ofChancellorAngela Merkel,[12] succeedingSabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger. He left his position of DeputyMinister-President of the Saarland and Minister of Economy, Labor, Energy and Transport he was holding since 9 May 2012.
Maas earned the nickname 'Prohibition Minister' by theFrankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung for his many unapproved legislative proposals.[13]
In June 2017, Maas disclosed to theBild newspaper that he was the recent recipient of an unprecedented number of death threats including a bullet casing in the mailbox of his private residence. He attributed the threats to dissatisfaction with current German immigration policy[14] since the beginning of the2015 European migrant crisis.
On September 25, 2018, at theUnited Nations, German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas could be seen smirking alongside his colleagues at US President Donald Trump who accused Germany of becoming ‘totally dependent’ on Russian energy.[15]
In December 2022, Maas resigned fromBundestag and announced his intention to leave national politics. He subsequently joined the Berlin office of law firm GSK Stockmann aspartner.[16] In January 2023,[17] he was also elected president of theVerband der Saarhütten,[18] a group representing employers in theSaarland steel industry.
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After taking office as foreign minister in 2018, Maas was markedly tougher than his immediate predecessors –Frank-Walter Steinmeier andSigmar Gabriel – in his rhetoric and approach towardsRussia. On his first day in office, he issued a frank warning about Russian “aggression” and chastised its leadership for “defining itself in antagonism to many in the west”.[26] Under his leadership, Germany – in coordination with its allies – expelled four Russian diplomats over Russia’s suspected involvement in the poisoning of former Russian double agentSergei Skripal in Salisbury, UK.[27]
Also, Maas has voted in favor of German participation inUnited Nations peacekeeping missions as well as in United Nations-mandatedEuropean Union peacekeeping missions on the African continent, such as inDarfur/Sudan (2017 and 2018),South Sudan (2017 and 2018) andMali (2017 and 2018).
Maas has supported the creation of an international financial system independent of the United States, including the creation of a European Monetary Fund and an independent version of theSWIFT network.[28]
In October 2018, Maas questioned thesale of German arms toSaudi Arabia after the murder of Saudi opposition journalistJamal Khashoggi.[29]
In November 2018, Maas raised the issue ofXinjiang internment camps andhuman rights abuses against the Uyghurs in a meeting with Chinese Vice PremierLiu He.[30]
Regarding theYemeni Civil War, Maas toldSpiegel Online: "In Yemen, an unprecedentedhumanitarian tragedy is unfolding before the eyes of the international community...The call from Mike Pompeo andJames Mattis for a ceasefire and the resumption of talks comes at the right time. We fully support their appeal."[31]
On 8 May 2019,European Union struggle to keep preserveIran Nuclear Deal agreement Maas said, “Our opinion is and remains: We want to preserve the agreement, in particular to prevent Iran from coming into possession of nuclear weapons, We don’t need further escalation in the region”.[32]
In September 2019, the Chinese Foreign Ministry called a meeting betweenHong Kong student activistJoshua Wong and Maas as "disrespectful of China's sovereignty and an interference in China's internal affairs".[33]
Maas condemned the2019 Turkish offensive into north-eastern Syria and warned that the offensive would cause more destabilization in the region and could cause ISIS to grow.[34]
On 3 January 2020, the high-level Iranian General,Qasem Soleimani, wasassassinated by the United States, which considerably heightened the existing tensions between the two countries. Maas said that the airstrikes had not "made it easier to reduce tensions", but noted they "followed a series of dangerous Iranian provocations".[35]
In June 2020, Maas warned thatIsrael's plannedannexation of parts of the occupiedWest Bank will be a violation of international law.[36] Following theGalwan Valley clash between Indian and Chinese troops, Maas urgedChina andIndia to de-escalate tensions to avoid a major conflict.[37]
There is a long-standingdispute between Turkey and Greece in theAegean Sea.[38] In August 2020, Maas warned that the "current situation in the eastern Mediterranean is equivalent to playing with fire. Every little spark can lead to catastrophe."[39]
Maas expressed deep concern over theescalation of hostilities in the disputed region ofNagorno-Karabakh and called onArmenia andAzerbaijan to immediately halt fighting and progress towards a peaceful resolution.[40]
On 26 October 2020, in response to the2020 Thai protests, Maas mentioned that Germany is continuing to monitor the behavior ofThai KingVajiralongkorn during the time he spends in Germany. He had "made clear that politics that concern the country of Thailand can’t be conducted from German soil" and if there are things that are considered to be illegal, it will have "immediate consequences."[41]
President Trump said in his speech to the UN General Assembly on 24 September 2018 that Germany will "become totally dependent on Russian energy if it doesn't change course immediately". Maas rejected this, telling reporters "Germany is not dependent on Russia, especially not on energy issues," and that Trump's accusation "does not correspond to reality".[42]
Following the release of theSenate Intelligence Committee report on CIA torture in December 2014, Maas told German newspaperBild: "The CIA's practice of torture is gruesome […] Everybody involved must be legally prosecuted."[43]
In early 2015, Maas successfully introduced a new law meant to mitigate radical Islamist attacks, by making it a criminal offence to travel abroad to receive military training.[44] Shortly after, he and Interior MinisterThomas de Maizière (CDU) jointly submitted a draft law permitting the temporaryretention of internet and telephone data – excluding e-mail traffic – to aid criminal investigations.[45]
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In July 2015, Maas announced plans to amend Germany'spenal code onsexual assault in accordance with theIstanbul Convention of theCouncil of Europe; the reform is to punish abuse which exploits a victim's fear of a "perceived menace" and tighten sentences in rape cases.[46]
In August 2015, Maas initiated the dismissal and retirement ofchief federal prosecutorHarald Range; his ministry had questioned Range's decision to open a much-criticized treason investigation against journalists ofnetzpolitik.org who had reported about plans of Germany's domestic spy agency – theFederal Office for the Protection of the Constitution – to expand surveillance of online communication.[47] Range, meanwhile, had accused the government of interfering in the investigation.[47]
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In a 2014 interview with theFinancial Times, Maas called it "not acceptable" thatGoogle "dominates the search engine world, and is able to rank its search results in a manner apt to promote its own business interests."[48] In 2015, he endorsed criticism expressed by Federation of German Consumer Organizations (VzBz) which held thatFacebook’s data protection terms were too vague.[49] Later that year, he publicly accused Facebook of doing too little to thwart racist posts and hate comments on the social media platform.[50]
After theNetzpolitik scandal in 2015, where a German language blog leaked top secret documents, Maas proposed new legislation called 'Data Stolen Goods'.[51] Ulf Buermeyer, a judge at the District Court in Berlin[52] cautioned that this anti-whistleblower law would be a massive attack on democracy andfreedom of speech.[53]
The law was passed as Section 202d of the German Penal Code (§202d StGB)[51] by theBundestag on 16 October 2015.[54]
In early 2017, Maas proposed the "Netzwerkdurchsetzungsgesetz" ("network enforcement law") to combatonline hate speech andfake news.[55][56][57] TheUnited Nations responded with a letter, warning that several democratic freedoms were under attack.[58] The proposed law was met with criticism throughout Germany from industry associations, IT experts, scientists, net-politicians, lawyers, privacy activists and civil rights campaigners who regard it as unconstitutional and defiant of EU-law and warn of "catastrophic effects forfreedom of expression", causing online platforms to drasticallycensor online speech, resulting in privatization of legal enforcement and abolishingonline anonymity.[59][60][61][62][63][64]
The law was passed on 30 June 2017. It also requires social networks, such as Facebook and Twitter, to publish a biannual report on received complaints and how they dealt with them.[65][66] Fines of up to €50 million are possible for companies that "systematically refuse to act or do not set up a proper complaint management system" and some warn that this threat of punishment may motivate companies to delete content rather than risk punishment.[65] In 2018, it was reported that the law had led to the deletion of one of Maas's own tweets in which he said an opponent was an "idiot".[67][better source needed]
On 22 June 2017, Maas expanded by 27 the number of offenses for which a lawful online search using malware can be used.[68][69][70] Experts and civil rights defenders have strongly criticized the law for being a gross provocation, violating privacy and undermining cyber-security. Maas has also been accused of using tricks for the proceeding of passing these amendments and using a "backdoor" that has "nothing to do withdemocratic debate culture".[71]
After the massive sexual assaults of New Year 2016 in Cologne,[72] Heiko Maas wanted to reform sexual prosecution laws.[73] Tonio Walter, writing an op-ed inDie Zeit, said that the law was overly broad: under a proposed ban on groping, he claimed, a wife could be punished for embracing her husband from behind, while rules against sex by coercion could punish a boss whose employee consented to sex under a (possibly mistaken, said Walter) fear of losing the job. Walter likewise said that the penalty of 10 years in prison for a sexual assault and 15 for rape by coercion would be too much, noting that non-sexual assaults received a lesser penalty under the laws.[74]
In April 2016, Maas called for a legal ban on sexist advertisements, which "reduce women or men to sexual objects." Germany's Association of Communications Agencies (GWA) observed that it is a subjective matter of taste whether an advertisement is sexist or not. FDP leaderChristian Lindner remarked that the proposed ban indicated a similar mindset as radical Islamic leaders.[75]
Latvia: Grand Officer of theOrder of the Three Stars[76]In 2018, Maas divorced his wife Corinna, with whom he had been married since 2000 and had two sons. In spring 2016, Maas and actressNatalia Wörner first appeared as a couple. On 23 August 2023, Wörner and Maas announced that they had separated some time ago. He has been in a relationship with his former wife Corinna again since the end of 2023.
Maas enjoys football and is atriathlete. He is a fan ofHamburger SV.
| Political offices | ||
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| Preceded byas Minister of Justice | Minister of Justice and Consumer Protection 2013–2018 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded byas Minister of Food, Agriculture and Consumer Protection | ||
| Preceded by | Minister for Foreign Affairs 2018–2021 | Succeeded by |
| International | |
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| National | |
| Academics | |
| People | |
| Other | |
