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Cecilia Malmström | |
|---|---|
 Malmström in 2024 | |
| European Commissioner for Trade | |
| In office 1 November 2014 – 30 November 2019 | |
| Commission | Juncker |
| Preceded by | Karel De Gucht |
| Succeeded by | Phil Hogan |
| European Commissioner for Home Affairs | |
| In office 9 February 2010 – 1 November 2014 | |
| Commission | Barroso II |
| Preceded by | Jacques Barrot |
| Succeeded by | Dimitris Avramopoulos (Migration, Home Affairs andCitizenship) |
| Minister for European Union Affairs | |
| In office 6 October 2006 – 22 January 2010 | |
| Prime Minister | Fredrik Reinfeldt |
| Preceded by | New office |
| Succeeded by | Birgitta Ohlsson |
| Member of the European Parliament forSweden | |
| In office 1 July 1999 – 4 October 2006 | |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Anna Cecilia Malmström (1968-05-15)15 May 1968 (age 57) Stockholm, Sweden |
| Party | Liberals (before 2023) Independent (2023–present) |
| Other political affiliations | Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe |
| Education | University of Gothenburg University of Paris |
| Signature |  |
| Website | Official website |
Anna Cecilia Malmström (born 15 May 1968) is a Swedish politician who served asEuropean Commissioner for Trade from 2014 to 2019. She previously served asEuropean Commissioner for Home Affairs from 2010 to 2014 andMinister for European Union Affairs from 2006 to 2010. She was aMember of the European Parliament (MEP) from Sweden from 1999 to 2006.
She was a member of the SwedishLiberals (part of theAlliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe) until 2023.
Malmström was born inBrännkyrka parish in southernStockholm and grew up inGothenburg.
She was a student at theUniversity of Gothenburg from 1992 to 1999, becoming a research assistant (1994). She then gained a PhD in political science with a thesis titledThe Region, the Power and the Glory: Regional Parties in Western Europe[1] (1998), and became a senior lecturer at the Department of Political Science at the University of Gothenburg (1998–99).[2] Her thesis was on regional parties in western Europe, focusing onCatalonia, Spain andLombardy, Italy.[3] She has researched and taught in the fields ofEuropean politics,regionalism, immigration andterrorism.
Malmström has also worked inStuttgart and inBarcelona.
She is fluent inSwedish, English, Spanish and French, and has intermediate skills in German and Italian.
Malmström has been a member of the Swedish Liberals party since the late 1980s, sitting on the party executive since 1997, and was a member of theVästra Götaland Regional Council from 1998 to 2001. In 2007, whenJan Björklund was elected party leader, she was appointed first vice party chairman.
In 1999, Malmström waselected as an MEP for Sweden and she wasre-elected again in 2004. During her tenure she served on theCommittees on Foreign Affairs,Committee on Constitutional Affairs,Committee on the Internal Market and Consumer Protection and also on theSubcommittee on Human Rights andSubcommittee on Security and Defence. In addition, she served as vice-chair of the parliament's delegations toHungary (before it joined in 2004) andCroatia.
As a member of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, Malmström wrote a critical report on the EU's Russia strategy. In 2002 she became the Liberal group's spokeswoman on foreign affairs.[3] She nominated Cuban dissidentOswaldo Payá for theSakharov Prize, which he received from the Parliament in 2002.[3]
During her time as an MEP, Malmström initiated theoneseat.eu web campaign,[4] which aims to makeBrussels the permanent seat of theEuropean Parliament. It was the first such petition to gain one million signatures, a nod to the right of petition under theTreaty of Lisbon.
In 2001, Malmström and nine fellow MEPs – includingNick Clegg andHelle Thorning-Schmidt – founded the Campaign for Parliamentary Reform (CPR) to press for changes to the way the European Parliament functions on a day-to-day basis.[5] She has also campaigned for greater public access to official documents.[6]
Following the2006 Swedish elections which saw the victory of thecentre-right coalition ofFredrik Reinfeldt, Malmström returned to Sweden to take up the job ofMinister for European Affairs in Prime Minister Reinfeldt's cabinet, which took office on 6 October 2006. Her responsibilities included institutional issues, review of the EU budget, Baltic Sea Strategy, theLisbon Strategy and coordinating the SwedishPresidency of the Council of the European Union in 2009.
Malmström supports Swedish adoption of the euro currency, and in August 2007 she was one of the politicians calling for anotherreferendum on euro membership (the first was in 2003). "We respect the result of the referendum, of course, but still think that one should be able to argue for something one believes in, a lot had changed since the 2003 referendum, Slovenia has joined, Malta and Cyprus are joining at the beginning of next year. Next year, at least two Baltic countries will join. In 2010–11 there could be eight or nine new members. The more members there are, the greater the political price of being outside, because we can't make a difference, Sweden had lost out economically by not joining the single European currency." She cited a report from the National Board of Trade: "We have lost 100 billion kronor in exports and the same amount in imports. Our trade with the eurozone would have been 13–14 percent greater if we had been members."[7]
On 17 November 2009 Malmström was nominated by her government as Sweden's nextEuropean Commissioner.[8] In his nomination, Prime Minister Reinfeldt also said thatCarl Bildt, the foreign minister, was not nominated because it was unlikely that a Swede would be appointed to the post ofPresident of the European Council or asHigh Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy.[8]
ThePresident of the European Commission,José Manuel Barroso offered Malmström the role ofCommissioner for Home Affairs, which was created as a result of a liberal demand to split the previous portfolio, which had also included human rights. Despite this post being security oriented, Commissioner Malmström made clear to the Members of the European Parliament that she would not be abad cop to thefundamental rights portfolio'sgood cop. She was approved by MEPs, and took up the post on 10 February 2010.[9]
One of her first initiatives as aCommissioner of theEuropean Union was to propose adirective advocating stronger sanctions against sexual abuse of children,[10] in which one of the proposals was to create a duty for EU member states to block access to child pornography on the Internet.[11] Critics interpret that as the creation of a net censorship infrastructure which would not help children, but would indeed be counterproductive[12] and a dangerous threat to democracy.[13] NGOs working for children's rights, such as Save the Children and NSPCC, have, however, defended the proposal.[14] Malmström was quickly rewarded with the nickname 'Censilia' on the social web and in – mostly German – dailies,[15][16][17] aportmanteau word blending the word "censorship" and her given name ("Cecilia"), in imitation of the "Zensursula" nickname of the German ministerUrsula von der Leyen who failed to establish similar filtering techniques in Germany following a decision to prioritize the deletion of illegal websites.
At the same period (March 2010), in pursuit of her efforts to strengthen the safety and security ofEuropean citizens, Malmström secured a political agreement between theEuropean Parliament, the Council and theCommission to implement Article 10 of the United Nations' Firearms Protocol that combats the trafficking of illicit civilian firearms.[18]
On 11 March 2011, during the Seventh European Day of Remembrance of Victims of Terrorism, at a conference on "The role of Victims of Terrorism in preventing violent radicalization", which was held in Brussels, Malmström gave a speech setting out the devastating effects of terrorism on a personal as well as on a state level,[19] closing with the announcement of the forthcoming (R.A.N.) project (see next paragraph).
In September 2011, Malmström officially launched the Radicalisation Awareness Network (R.A.N.),[20] a project aimed at tackling terrorism andviolent extremism through preventive measures, rather than through confrontation. The project comes as an additional tool of the EU's Counter-Terrorism and Measures to Combat Radicalisation and Recruitment to Terrorism Strategies.
Less than a year later, the project had become a pan-European network of scientists, psychologists, NGOs, victims of terrorism, religious leaders, representatives of civil society and police officers, together with an advisory board.[21]
On 2 May 2012, Malmström gave a lecture to students and professors atHarvard University on immigration and asylum, discussing with her audience various issues related to integration, terrorism and human trafficking, as well as the European crisis. The visit inCambridge was followed by a meeting with theUS Attorney GeneralEric Holder in Washington, D.C., and an evening at theF.B.I., where there was a major exchange of views about the planning of the forthcoming European Cybercrime Centre (E.C.3).[22] Malmström's short trip in the US was completed with a speech on Cyber Security at a Conference in theC.S.I.S.
On 26 November 2012, together withRob Wainwright, director ofEuropol, Malmström announced the launch of the new European Financial Coalition against Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children Online.[23][24]The aims of the Coalition are to support international law enforcement investigations wherever possible through co-operation with private stakeholders; to assess and study commercial child sexual exploitation on the Internet through all kinds of Internet environments, such as hosting services and newsgroups; to help protect legitimate private business interests from possible misuse of their services by criminals aiming to distribute child sexual abuse content through different information and communication technologies; to enable law enforcement and private companies to counteract the problem through training and resource-sharing; and to keep decision makers informed and raise awareness among the public.
On 5 December 2012 on a conference held inBrussels,Belgium, under the High Patronage ofHer Majesty Queen Paola of Belgium,[25] Malmström andUS Attorney GeneralEric Holder launched the Global Alliance against Child Sexual Abuse Online.
The alliance, which met strong support from Wainwright,[26] is an initiative aimed at uniting decision-makers all around the world, to improve the identification of, and assistance to, victims, and the prosecution of the perpetrators. The alliance is one of the greatest projects ever created in this field, as its participants include 48 nations worldwide (The 27 EU member states, as well as 21 non EU countries –Albania, Australia,Cambodia,Croatia, Georgia,Ghana, Japan,Moldova,Montenegro, New Zealand,Nigeria,Norway, thePhilippines,Serbia,Republic of Korea,Switzerland,Thailand,Turkey,Ukraine, United States of America, andVietnam).
On 11 January 2013, Wainwright and Malmström officially launched the European Cybercrime Centre (EC3), which is aiming to tackle cybercrime:
Malmström assumed the duties of EUCommissioner for Trade on 1 November 2014, as a member of theJuncker Commission.
In July 2014, Swedish prime ministerFredrik Reinfeldt nominated Malmström for a second term as European Commissioner. By September, the European Parliament gave its support to her nomination.[27] She assumed the duties of EUCommissioner for Trade on 1 November 2014, as a member of theJuncker Commission.[28]
Already in her nomination hearing, amid theRusso-Ukrainian War, Malmström rejected Russia's demands for amendments to afree-trade agreement between the EU andUkraine.[29] In December 2015, she failed in her final attempt to reach a breakthrough over Russia's concerns, some of which were contrary to European andWorld Trade Organization rules.[30]
The mission letter for Malmström's position also included, as one of her key duties, the "successful conclusion" of the controversial trade negotiations with the US, theTransatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), though with a number of restrictions and confinements to the negotiation mandate to address European public concerns over TTIP.[31] Having expressed a view strongly in favour of the treaty,[32] she tried to revive the negotiations with the USA two weeks after entering office.[33] Despite claims of an "unprecedented level of transparency", the treaty drafts could not be read by all parliaments of EU member states, such as the GermanBundestag, or political leaders such as then-vice chancellorSigmar Gabriel.[34]
In May 2015, Malmström and Turkish Economy MinisterNihat Zeybekci announced a framework for broadening theEuropean Union–Turkey Customs Union, extending it to include services, government contracting and most agricultural goods.[35] Also under her leadership, the EU finalized the negotiations on a major trade agreement withVietnam in August 2015, removing 99 per cent of tariffs between Europe and Vietnam over the following decade as well as non-tariff barriers to trade, services, investment, intellectual property, sanitary and phytosanitary measures, government procurement, dispute settlement and sustainable development.[36][37]
Since 2019, Malmström has been a visiting professor at theSchool of Business, Economics and Law at the University of Gothenburg. Also since 2019, she has been serving on the Transatlantic Task Force of theGerman Marshall Fund and theFederal Chancellor Helmut Schmidt Foundation (BKHS), co-chaired byKaren Donfried andWolfgang Ischinger.[38]
In September 2020, the government of Prime MinisterStefan Löfven nominated Malmström as Sweden's candidate for secretary general of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).[39] During the selection process, she became a finalist but ultimately lost out againstMathias Cormann in March 2021.[40]
From 2021 to 2022, Malmström was a member of theTrilateral Commission’s Task Force on Global Capitalism in Transition, chaired byCarl Bildt,Kelly Grier andTakeshi Niinami.[41]
In 2022, Malmström joined the Brussels office of law firmCovington & Burling as senior advisor.[42] Since 2023, she has been part of theCentre for European Policy Studies/Heinrich Böll Foundation High-Level Group on Bolstering EU Democracy, chaired byKalypso Nicolaïdis.[43]
In May 2023, Malmström announced that she had quit the Swedish Liberal Party, due to her opposition to the party's participation in theTidö Agreement.[44][45]
In a discussion with John Hilary, the executive director ofWar on Want, which he wrote about inThe Independent on 12 October 2015, Malmström reportedly acknowledged "that a trade deal has never inspired such passionate and widespread opposition" and is reported to have commented: "I do not take my mandate from the European people."[51] Malmström later denied having said this, calling it a "fabricated quote" extrapolated from her explanations about theTTIP negotiation mandate, which is determined by the European governments and not by the Europeans themselves.[52] She also argued before theEuropean Parliament that she did take her mandate from the European people since she was approved asCommissioner by the MEPs who represent them.[53] Hilary did not retract his version of the story.[52]
Malmström is married and has children. She lives in Brussels, Belgium.[54] She is the author of several books, articles and essays on regional parties, regionalism, Spanish politics, European politics, immigration and terrorism.
| Political offices | ||
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| Preceded byas Minister for Government Coordination | Minister for European Union Affairs 2006–2010 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | President of the Council of the European Union 2009–2010 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Swedish European Commissioner 2010–2019 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded byasEuropean Commissioner for Justice, Freedom and Security | European Commissioner for Home Affairs 2010–2014 | Succeeded byas European Commissioner for Migration, Home Affairs andCitizenship |
| Preceded by | European Commissioner for Trade 2014–2019 | Succeeded by |
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