Corina Crețu (born June 24, 1967 in

Bucharest Bucharest ( , ; ro, București ) is the capital and largest city of Romania, as well as its cultural, industrial, and financial centre. It is located in the southeast of the country, on the banks of the Dâmbovița River, less than north of ...

) is a Romanian politician and a former

European Commissioner for Cohesion and Reforms The Commissioner for Cohesion and Reforms is a portfolio within the European Commission. The current Commissioner is Elisa Ferreira. The portfolio is responsible for managing the regional policy of the European Union, such as the European Region ...

. Crețu is a member of the Romanian

PRO Romania PRO Romania (, PRO) is a minor extra-parliamentary social liberal political party in Romania. History The founding of PRO Romania was initiated in 2017 by former Prime Minister Victor Ponta, former acting/ad interim Prime Minister and Minist ...

and

Member of the European Parliament A Member of the European Parliament (MEP) is a person who has been elected to serve as a popular representative in the European Parliament. When the European Parliament (then known as the Common Assembly of the ECSC) first met in 1952, its ...

(sitting with the

Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats The Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats (S&D) is the political group in the European Parliament of the Party of European Socialists (PES). The Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats was officially founded as a Socialist ...

). Between June 2014 and October 2014, she served as a

Vice-President of the European Parliament There are fourteen vice-presidents of the European Parliament who sit in for the president in presiding over the plenary of the European Parliament. Role Vice-presidents are members of the Bureau and chair the plenary when the president is not i ...

Political career

Crețu studied at the

Academy of Economic Studies The Bucharest University of Economic Studies ( ro, Academia de Studii Economice din București, abbreviated ''ASE'') is a public university in Bucharest, Romania. Founded in 1913 as the ''Academy of Higher-level Commercial and Industrial Studies'' ...

, Faculty of

Cybernetics Cybernetics is a wide-ranging field concerned with circular causality, such as feedback, in regulatory and purposive systems. Cybernetics is named after an example of circular causal feedback, that of steering a ship, where the helmsperson m ...

, graduating in 1989. She spent a year working as an economist at a factory in

Blaj Blaj (; archaically spelled as ''Blaș''; hu, Balázsfalva; german: Blasendorf; Transylvanian Saxon dialect, Transylvanian Saxon: ''Blußendref'') is a municipiu, city in Alba County, Transylvania, Romania. It has a population of 20,630 inhabita ...

until 1990. She then worked as a journalist and political commentator between 1990 and 1992 for newspapers ''

Azi ''Azi'' (''Today'' in Romanian) is a Romanian daily newspaper published in Bucharest. The paper was started in 1990. Today was also the name of a literary magazine published monthly in Romania, from March 1932 to August 1938, under the directio ...

'', ''

Curierul Național ''Curierul Naţional'' (''The National Courier'' in Romanian) is a Romanian daily newspaper published in Bucharest Bucharest ( , ; ro, București ) is the capital and largest city of Romania, as well as its cultural, industrial, and financia ...

'', and ''Cronica Română'' before joining the Spokesperson's office of the Cabinet of

President President most commonly refers to: *President (corporate title) *President (education), a leader of a college or university *President (government title) President may also refer to: Automobiles * Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese ful ...

Ion Iliescu Ion Iliescu (; born 3 March 1930) is a Romanian politician and engineer who served as President of Romania from 1989 until 1996 and from 2000 until 2004. Between 1996 and 2000 and also from 2004 to 2008, the year in which he retired, Iliescu ...

(1992-1996). In 1996, she became a member of the Romanian Social Democratic Party (PDSR). Between 2000 and 2004, Crețu was Presidential Advisor, Presidential Spokesperson and Head of the Public Communication Department during

's second mandate as Romanian president. In 2000 she was elected Deputy in Romania's Parliament and, in 2004, to the

Romanian Senate ) is the upper house in the bicameral Parliament of Romania. It has 136 seats (before the 2016 Romanian legislative election the total number of elected representatives was 176), to which members are elected by direct popular vote using party-list ...

. As a Senator, she sat on the Foreign Policy Committee, and was a full member of the Romanian Delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the

OSCE The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) is the world's largest regional security-oriented intergovernmental organization with observer status at the United Nations. Its mandate includes issues such as arms control, prom ...

. In January 2005, at the invitation of the Jordanian Government, she conducted a training seminar at

Amman Amman (; ar, عَمَّان, ' ; Ammonite language, Ammonite: 𐤓𐤁𐤕 𐤏𐤌𐤍 ''Rabat ʻAmān'') is the capital and largest city of Jordan, and the country's economic, political, and cultural center. With a population of 4,061,150 a ...

for appointees to spokesperson positions in

Iraq Iraq,; ku, عێراق, translit=Êraq officially the Republic of Iraq, '; ku, کۆماری عێراق, translit=Komarî Êraq is a country in Western Asia. It is bordered by Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq ...

. Crețu was also an OSCE observer to the parliamentary election of March 2005 in

Moldova Moldova ( , ; ), officially the Republic of Moldova ( ro, Republica Moldova), is a Landlocked country, landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Romania to the west and Ukraine to the north, east, and south. The List of states ...

and to the general election of 2006 in

Bosnia and Herzegovina Bosnia and Herzegovina ( sh, / , ), abbreviated BiH () or B&H, sometimes called Bosnia–Herzegovina and often known informally as Bosnia, is a country at the crossroads of south and southeast Europe, located in the Balkans. Bosnia and H ...

. In 2005, Crețu was appointed a member of the Romanian parliamentary delegation to the

European Parliament The European Parliament (EP) is one of the legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it adopts ...

. She was elected

(MEP), sitting with the

on January 1, 2007 following the

accession of Romania to the European Union On 1 January 2007, Bulgaria and Romania became member states of the European Union (EU) in the fifth wave of EU enlargement. Negotiations Romania was the first country of post-communist Europe to have official relations with the European Comm ...

, being re-elected as an MEP in 2009 and 2014. In 2013, she was elected Vice-President of the Romanian Social Democratic Party (PSD). Crețu announced on 17 January 2019 that she would be a candidate in the

European Parliament election Elections to the European Parliament take place every five years by universal adult suffrage; with more than 400 million people eligible to vote, they are considered the second largest democratic elections in the world after India's. Unti ...

on behalf of the party

Pro Romania PRO Romania (, PRO) is a minor extra-parliamentary social liberal political party in Romania. History The founding of PRO Romania was initiated in 2017 by former Prime Minister Victor Ponta, former acting/ad interim Prime Minister and Minist ...

. She was at the second position in the list after

Victor Ponta Victor Viorel Ponta (; born 20 September 1972) is a Romanian jurist and politician, who served as Prime Minister of Romania between his appointment by President Traian Băsescu in May 2012 and his resignation in November 2015. A former member of ...

. She joined Victor Ponta's

in March 2019.

Personal life

Her father, Traian Crețu (1937–1995), was Professor of Physics at the

Politehnica University of Bucharest Politehnica University of Bucharest ( ro, Universitatea Politehnica din București) is a technical university in Bucharest, Romania. 200 years of activity have been celebrated lately, as the university was founded in 1818.University of Bucharest The University of Bucharest ( ro, Universitatea din București), commonly known after its abbreviation UB in Romania, is a public university founded in its current form on by a decree of Prince Alexandru Ioan Cuza to convert the former Princel ...

. In 2012, Crețu married Ovidiu Rogoz, a Romanian businessman, at the New Church of St Spyridon in Bucharest. Personal e-mails Cretu had exchanged with then

U.S. Secretary of State The United States secretary of state is a member of the executive branch of the federal government of the United States and the head of the U.S. Department of State. The office holder is one of the highest ranking members of the president's Ca ...

Colin Powell Colin Luther Powell ( ; April 5, 1937 – October 18, 2021) was an American politician, statesman, diplomat, and United States Army officer who served as the 65th United States Secretary of State from 2001 to 2005. He was the first African ...

were accessed by the hacker Guccifer, who broke into Powell’s personal email account and posted a link to some of the correspondence on Powell’s

Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin M ...

page.Colin Powell denies affair after emails are hacked by mysterious 'Guccifer'
by Jonathan Easley,'' The Hill'', 1 August 2013 Powell said in a statement that he had stayed in touch with Cretu by email since stepping down as secretary of state in 2005, and that "over time the emails became of a very personal nature, but did not result in an affair.” He added that "those types of emails ended a few years ago. There was no affair then and there is not one now.”Colin Powell forced to deny affair with Romanian diplomat
by Raf Sanchez, ''

The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a national British daily broadsheet newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed across the United Kingdom and internationally. It was fo ...

'', 2 August 2013

Honours

* '' Cavaler'',

Order of the Star of Romania The Order of the Star of Romania (Romanian: ''Ordinul Steaua României'') is Romania's highest civil Order and second highest State decoration after the defunct Order of Michael the Brave. It is awarded by the President of Romania. It has five r ...

(2013)

References

External links

European Parliament profile

European Parliament official photo
* Creţu'
Official website
and

blog A blog (a truncation of "weblog") is a discussion or informational website published on the World Wide Web consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style text entries (posts). Posts are typically displayed in reverse chronological order ...

* Corina Creţu
The British War Against Immigrants is Anti-European, Unjustified and Wrong
Huffington Post, 2 June 2014. *
Corina Creţu at the Romanian Senate site
*
Corina Creţu at the Romanian Chamber of Deputies site

www.elections2014.eu
, - {{DEFAULTSORT:Cretu, Corina 1967 births Knights of the Order of the Star of Romania Living people Members of the Chamber of Deputies (Romania) Members of the Senate of Romania MEPs for Romania 2014–2019 MEPs for Romania 2019–2024 Romanian European Commissioners Women European Commissioners Women MEPs for Romania 21st-century Romanian politicians European Commissioners 2014–2019