Kent Härstedt (born 29 January 1965, in

Helsingborg Helsingborg (, , , ) is a city and the seat of Helsingborg Municipality, Scania (Skåne), Sweden. It is the second-largest city in Scania (after Malmö) and ninth-largest in Sweden, with a population of 113,816 (2020). Helsingborg is the cent ...

) is a

Swedish Swedish or ' may refer to: Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically: * Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland ** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...

social democratic

politician A politician is a person active in party politics, or a person holding or seeking an elected office in government. Politicians propose, support, reject and create laws that govern the land and by an extension of its people. Broadly speaking ...

member Member may refer to: * Military jury, referred to as "Members" in military jargon * Element (mathematics), an object that belongs to a mathematical set * In object-oriented programming, a member of a class ** Field (computer science), entries in ...

of the Riksdag from 1998 to 2018. Actively interested in politics since the age of 16, he was elected to the municipal council of

, where he remained for six years. He worked as political adviser to vice foreign minister

Pierre Schori Jean-Pierre Olov Schori (born 14 October 1938, in Norrköping) is a Swedish diplomat and politician. For many years he was international secretary in the Swedish Social Democratic Party and a close assistant to the Swedish Prime Minister Olof ...

between 1994 and 1996, and as a freelance writer for amongst others '' Svenska Dagbladet'', ''

Helsingborgs Dagblad ''Helsingborgs Dagblad'' (''HD'', lit. "Helsingborg's Daily Paper"), published in Helsingborg in Skåne is the largest (circ. 84.000) newspaper in Swedish outside the metropolitan districts of Malmö, Göteborg and Stockholm. History and pro ...

'', and '' Arbetarbladet''. In 1998 he was elected to the Riksdag and remained until 2018. In 2004 and 2005, he was also alcohol commissioner for the Swedish government. Härstedt is the elected vice President of the

OSCE Parliamentary Assembly The Parliamentary Assembly of the OSCE (OSCE PA) is an institution of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe. The primary task of the 323-member Assembly is to facilitate inter-parliamentary dialogue, an important aspect of the o ...

2014–2017. At the election to

Ukraine's parliament The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine ( uk, Верхо́вна Ра́да Украї́ни, translit=, Verkhovna Rada Ukrainy, translation=Supreme Council of Ukraine, Ukrainian abbreviation ''ВРУ''), often simply Verkhovna Rada or just Rada, is the ...

on 26 October 2014, Härstedt was the special coordinator for 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 ...

observer mission. Härstedt was the OSCE special coordinator in the presidential elections in Belarus 2015 and in the parliamentary elections on 26 October 2016. He is since 2015 the chaIr of the OSCE PAs ad hoc working group on Belarus. Since 2017 Härstedt is chairman of Forum Syd, the largest Swedish NGO in support of civil society. Between 1999 and 2005, he was the chairman of the Swedish branch of

UNICEF UNICEF (), originally called the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund in full, now officially United Nations Children's Fund, is an agency of the United Nations responsible for providing humanitarian and developmental aid to ...

. Between 2009-2011 Härstedt was the president of the Swedish Judo Fedreation. Härstedt holds a black belt in Judo. Between January 2022 and January 2023, Härstedt was Sweden's ambassador to Singapore. Härstedt is a survivor of the disaster in September 1994.

References

External links

Riksdagen: Kent Härstedt (s)

Kent Härstedt – www.socialdemokraterna.se

Kent Härstedt
(personal homepage) People from Helsingborg 1965 births Living people Members of the Riksdag from the Social Democrats Members of the Riksdag 2002–2006 Shipwreck survivors {{Sweden-SocialDemocratic-politician-stub Ambassadors of Sweden to Singapore