Pascal Arimont (born 25 September 1974) is a Belgian

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 ...

(MEP) for the Christian Social Party, which sits in the

EPP Group The European People's Party Group (EPP Group) is a centre-right political group of the European Parliament consisting of deputies (MEPs) from the member parties of the European People's Party (EPP). Sometimes it also includes independent MEPs ...

, as the single MEP from the

German-speaking electoral college The German-speaking electoral college is one of three constituencies of the European Parliament in Belgium. It elects one MEP and is the only constituency to make use of first past the post. This is the European Parliament's smallest constitue ...

of Belgium.

Early life and career

Arimont was born in

Malmedy Malmedy (; german: Malmünd, ; wa, Måmdiy) is a city and municipality of Wallonia located in the province of Liège, Belgium. On January 1, 2018, Malmedy had a total population of 12,654. The total area is 99.96 km2 which gives a populati ...

and grew up in Born (municipality of

Amel Amel (; french: Amblève, ) is a Belgian municipality in the Walloon province of Liège, and is part of the German-speaking Community of Belgium (german: Deutschsprachige Gemeinschaft Belgiens). On January 1, 2013, the municipality of Amel had ...

) in the

German-speaking Community of Belgium The German-speaking Community (german: links=no, Deutschsprachige Gemeinschaft, or DG; french: links=no, Communauté germanophone; nl, links=no, Duitstalige Gemeenschap), since 2017 also known as East Belgium (german: links=no, Ostbelgien), is ...

. From 1998 to 2002, Arimont was parliamentary assistant to MEP

Mathieu Grosch Mathieu Jean Hubert Grosch (born 14 September 1950, in Eupen) is a Belgian politician and Member of the European Parliament for the German-speaking Community of Belgium with the CSP-EVP, Member of the Bureau of the European People's Party and sits ...

Political career

Role in local politics

From 2006 until 2009, Arimont served as provincial councillor of

Liège Liège ( , , ; wa, Lîdje ; nl, Luik ; german: Lüttich ) is a major city and municipality of Wallonia and the capital of the Belgian province of Liège. The city is situated in the valley of the Meuse, in the east of Belgium, not far from b ...

(and thus advisory member of the

Parliament of the German-speaking Community The Parliament of the German-speaking Community (german: Parlament der Deutschsprachigen Gemeinschaft or PDG) is the legislative assembly of the German-speaking Community of Belgium located in Eupen. The most important tasks of the Parliament of ...

). From 2009 until 2014 he was (full) member of that Parliament, where he was parliamentary group leader for the CSP.

Member of the European Parliament, 2014–present

In 2014, Grosch, who was the single German-speaking MEP since 1994, decided not to stand for re-election, and Arimont was the CSP's candidate in the 2014 European Parliament elections. In the European Parliament, Arimont serves on the

Committee on Regional Development The Committee on Regional Development (REGI) is a committee of the European Parliament. Its current chair, elected on 10 July 2019, is Younous Omarjee Younous Omarjee (born 30 September 1969 in Saint-Denis, Réunion) is a French politician who ...

and the

Committee on Legal Affairs The Committee on Legal Affairs (JURI) is a committee of the European Parliament. Responsibilities The main responsibilities of the committee are the interpretation and application of international and European law and the compliance of European U ...

(since 2021). Since 2021, he has been part of the Parliament's delegation to the

Conference on the Future of Europe The Conference on the Future of Europe was a proposal of the European Commission and the European Parliament, announced at the end of 2019, with the aim of looking at the medium to long term future of the EU and what reforms should be made to i ...

. In addition to his committee assignments, Arimont is part of the parliament's delegations for relations with the countries of Central America and to the

Euro-Latin American Parliamentary Assembly The Euro-Latin American Parliamentary Assembly (EuroLat) is a trans-national body of 150 Parliamentarians from Europe and Latin America. It was established in 2006 to bolster EU-Latin American relations. It was described by Benita Ferrero-Waldner, ...

. He is also a member of the European Parliament Intergroup on the Welfare and Conservation of Animals,

Controversy

In December 2021, Arimont’s house was attacked while his family was inside; a

Molotov cocktail A Molotov cocktail (among several other names – ''see other names'') is a hand thrown incendiary weapon constructed from a frangible container filled with flammable substances equipped with a fuse (typically a glass bottle filled with flamma ...

was thrown under his children’s bedroom windows.Lukas Kotkamp (December 6, 2021)
MEPs express solidarity with Belgian colleague after attack on his house
''

Politico Europe ''Politico Europe'' (stylized as ''POLITICO Europe'') is the European edition of the German-owned news organization ''Politico'' reporting on political affairs of the European Union. Its headquarters are located in Brussels with additional offices ...

''.

External links

Personal website

References

1974 births Christlich Soziale Partei (Belgium) MEPs German-speaking Community of Belgium Living people MEPs for Belgium 2014–2019 MEPs for Belgium 2019–2024 People from Malmedy {{Wallonia-politician-stub