30 Facts About Kaja Kallas

Kaja Kallas is an Estonian politician who has been prime minister of Estonia since 2021, and is the first woman to serve in the role.

Kaja Kallas is the daughter of Siim Kallas, who was the 14th prime minister of Estonia and later a European Commissioner.

Apart from Estonian, Kaja Kallas patrilineally has distant Latvian and Baltic German ancestry, as discovered by investigative journalists researching her father's ancestry shortly after his premiership.

Kaja Kallas graduated from the University of Tartu in 1999 with a bachelor's degree in law.

Kaja Kallas lived in France and Finland briefly while training in European law.

Kaja Kallas became a member of the Estonian Bar Association in 1999, and an attorney-at-law in 2002.

Kaja Kallas is a member of the European Antitrust Alliance.

In November 2018, Kaja Kallas published her memoir MEP: 4 aastat Euroopa Parlamendis, in which she described her life and work in Brussels from 2014 to 2018.

In 2010, Kaja Kallas decided to join the Estonian Reform Party.

Kaja Kallas ran for the Parliament of Estonia in 2011 for the Harju County and Rapla County constituency, receiving 7,157 votes.

Kaja Kallas was a member of the 12th Parliament of Estonia and chaired the Economic Affairs Committee from 2011 to 2014.

Kaja Kallas is a proponent of innovation and frequently emphasises that regulations cannot and must not hinder the technological revolution.

Kaja Kallas served as rapporteur for six reports: opinion on the ePrivacy Regulation, civil law rules on robotics, on the Annual report on EU Competition Policy, and on Delivering a New Deal for Energy Consumers, legislation on Custom infringements and sanctions, and the own-initiative report on the Digital Single Market.

On 13 December 2017, the Reform Party leader Hanno Pevkur announced that he would no longer run for the party leadership in January 2018, and suggested that Kaja Kallas should run instead.

Kaja Kallas won the leadership election held on 14 April 2018 and became the first female leader of a major political party in Estonia.

On 14 November 2020, Kaja Kallas was re-elected as leader of the Reform Party at a Reform Party Assembly.

Kaja Kallas initially resisted calls for government aid, suggesting that the government should search for long-term solutions rather than handing out government benefits, and that a free market should not require consistent government intervention to keep people afloat.

Kaja Kallas observed in a speech that the high cost of natural gas coupled with the Russia-Ukraine crisis was driving the increase in energy prices, and that the green energy measures Estonia adopted limited what the government could do to handle the crisis.

In January 2022, Kaja Kallas announced a 245 million euro plan to reduce the cost of energy from September 2021 to March 2022.

Kaja Kallas stated that Europe's dependence on Russian natural gas was a significant political problem.

In January 2022, Kaja Kallas committed Estonia to donating howitzers to Ukraine to assist in its defence against a possible Russian invasion, pending German approval as the howitzers were originally purchased from Germany.

Kaja Kallas was praised domestically for her leadership during the Russia-Ukraine crisis.

Kaja Kallas pledged to support Ukraine with political and materiel support.

Kaja Kallas has been praised both in Estonia and internationally as a leading pro-Ukrainian voice in the war, with the New Statesman calling her "Europe's New Iron Lady".

Kaja Kallas strongly supported the admission of Ukraine to the European Union, saying that there was "a moral duty" to do so.

In 2002, Kaja Kallas married Roomet Leiger and they divorced in 2006.

Kaja Kallas lived together with former Estonian politician and businessman Taavi Veskimagi who served as the country's Minister of Finance.

Apart from her native Estonian, Kaja Kallas is fluent in English, Russian and French.

Since 2020, Kaja Kallas is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Friends of Europe.

Kaja Kallas is a mentor of the European Liberal Youth, a member of the European Young Leaders, a MEP ambassor of Erasmus for Young Entrepreneurs, a member of the MEP Library Lovers Group, a political member of the European Internet Forum, a member of the extended board of the European Forum for Renewable Energy Sources, a member of the Global Young Leaders, a member of the Women Political Leaders, and a MEP ambassador of the European Entrepreneurship Education Network.