Marija Pejčinović-Burić
Date of Birth: 09.04.1963
Marija Pejčinović-Burić - Secretary General of the Council of Europe, Croatian politician, economist. Former Member of the Croatian Parliament (Sabor). Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign and European Affairs of Croatia (2017-2019). Member of the conservative Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ), which is part of the European People's Party.
Place of Birth. Education. Born on April 9, 1963, in Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina, SFR Yugoslavia.
In 1985, she graduated from the Faculty of Economics at the University of Zagreb. In 1994, she obtained a master's degree from the College of Europe.
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She speaks English, French, Spanish, and German.
Career. She worked in foreign trade companies and later held leadership positions in Croatian organizations dealing with European integration issues.
From 1997 to 2000, she was the director of the pharmaceutical company 'Pliva'.
In 2000, she was appointed Assistant Minister for European Integration.
From 2004 to 2005, she was State Secretary in the Ministry of European Integration, then until 2008 in the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs. At the same time, from 2006 to 2008, she was a member of the Croatian negotiating group on Croatia's EU membership, leading negotiations on foreign, security, and defense policy issues and others.
She joined the Croatian Democratic Union and was elected from this party's list as a member of the Sabor from 2008 to 2011.
From 2008 to 2011, she was the chairwoman of the Joint Parliamentary Committee Croatia-EU, head of the Croatian Parliament delegation to the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, member of the Committee on European Integration, the Committee on Foreign Affairs, the National Committee for Monitoring Negotiations, and vice-chairwoman of the Croatian Parliament delegations to the Parliamentary Assemblies of the Council of Europe, WEU, Parliamentary Assembly of the Union for the Mediterranean, member of the parliamentary Committee on Public Relations, the Parliamentary Assemblies of WEU, the Committee on Economic Affairs and Development of the Parliamentary Assembly Council, chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Development of the Parliamentary Assembly Council, chairwoman of the Croatian-American Society for Friendship in the Croatian Parliament.
From 2012 to 2013, she lectured on the Lisbon Treaty at seminars of the School for Public Administration of Croatia. She worked for several years as a consultant and lecturer. She was, among others, a private consultant for EU projects, the UN Development Programme, and joint financing projects in EU accession and potential candidate countries as well as in EU neighboring countries. She also advised the government of Serbia on European integration issues.
In 2016, she returned to public service and took the position of State Secretary in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and European Affairs.
After the appointment of Andrej Plenković as Prime Minister of Croatia, he appointed her as Minister of Foreign and European Affairs. On June 19, 2017, Marija Pejčinović-Burić assumed the office of Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign and European Affairs of Croatia.
On June 26, 2019, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe voted for the election of the 14th Secretary General of the organization after the candidates for the position of Foreign Minister were Pejčinović-Burić and her Belgian colleague Didier Reynders. Pejčinović Burić won with 159 to 105 votes against Reynders. She officially took her oath of office on September 18, 2019.
09.26.2023