She was prime minister three times, got into a scandal because of her husband. 5 facts about Kai Kallas

The High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Kaya Kallas, surprised journalists when she could not name the three branches of the EU government and made a lot of reservations during her speech. At the same time, according to the Russian SVR, Brussels is beginning to admit that they made a mistake with the appointment of Callas to the post of head of the European diplomacy. Thus, she was excluded from the preparation of EU strategic documents in the field of defense, and her participation in the discussion of the Ukrainian issue was practically reduced to zero. However, in the past, the former Prime Minister of Estonia got into a much more significant scandal when her family was caught up in business ties with Russia. What else is remarkable about the biography of Kai Kallas — in the material of Izvestia.

Fact 1. The deported family

• In her interviews, Callas often tells the story of how her maternal relatives were deported. In March 1949, during Operation Surf, her six-month-old mother, Kristy Kartus, her grandmother and great-grandmother were transported from Estonia to the Krasnoyarsk Territory. In total, about 21,000 residents of the Baltic Republic were displaced.

• According to Callas, her family was transported in cattle cars where there was no heating. Her mother was helped to survive by random fellow travelers: one of them gave his can of milk, and the other agreed to dry the diapers on his body. 10 years later, in 1959, the family was allowed to return and settle in Estonia again.

Fact 2. The Prime Minister's daughter

• The father of the future head of the European Diplomacy, Siim Kallas, began a successful career back in Soviet times. In 1972, he joined the CPSU and began working at the Ministry of Finance of the Estonian USSR. From 1979 to 1986, he headed the republican department of state savings banks of the USSR, and then for three years he was deputy editor of the Rahva Hääl newspaper, the printing organ of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Estonia. At that time, Kallas became famous in the republic as one of the authors of the program for Estonia's economic independence from the rest of the USSR.

• In independent Estonia, Kallas headed the central bank for four years and was responsible for the implementation of monetary reform. In 1994, he founded the Liberal Reform Party, under his leadership it was a member of the ruling coalition three times. Kallas consistently headed the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Finance, until he became Prime Minister in 2002 and served in this position for 15 months. Callas then held various positions at the European Commission for 10 years.

Fact 3. Dancing and theater

In childhood and at the dawn of her career, Callas was briefly associated with creative fields. She studied dancing in the children's and youth national ensemble Sõleke. Together with the band, she danced at the election events of the future first Prime Minister of post-Soviet Estonia, Edgar Savisaar. In the future, political tensions arose between him and Kallas, as Savisaar represented the Center Party of Estonia, which was close to the left, and Kallas chose her father's liberal course.

• As a first-year student at the University of Tartu, Kallas briefly worked in the first theater with performances in the Estonian language "Vanemuine". She served as an advisor to the head, and this was her first official job, after which she delved into law and took up competition law in various private companies.

Fact 4. Three times Prime Minister

Callas joined her father's Reform Party in 2010 at the age of 33. The following year, she was elected to the Estonian Parliament and headed the Economic commission for three years. In 2014, she left national politics and took up pan-European politics, being elected to the European Parliament, but returned when she was offered to lead her party.

• Back in 2019, after winning the election, Callas could have led the government for the first time, but her party was not included in the ruling coalition. The next chance came in 2021. Kallas joined forces with the Center Party and became the first female Prime Minister of Estonia.

• In three and a half years, Callas has assumed this position three times. The second term was preceded by a scandal over an attempt to pass a bill on the translation of preschool education into Estonian, which was opposed by Kallas' coalition partners. She managed to quickly come to an agreement with other parties and remain at the head of the Cabinet. Callas' third term began after the scheduled parliamentary elections. She continued to head the government until she received an offer to become head of European diplomacy in 2024.

Fact 5. The scandal with her husband

Callas' political career was almost ruined by the scandal with her second husband, businessman Arvo Hallik. In 2023, it turned out that Stark Logistics, in which he owned 24.9% of shares and held the post of finance director, serviced the Estonian company Metaprint and transported its cargo from Estonia to the aerosol bottle production plant in Russia. At the same time, Kallas called on Estonian and European companies to cut off all economic ties with Russia, even if it is not subject to sanctions.

• Callas justified herself by saying that she did not know about her husband's activities, and Stark Logistics assisted in shutting down the Metaprint business in Russia. According to her, the company did not pay a single ruble to the Russian budget, but the media still insisted that since February 2022, her husband's company Callas has sold goods worth more than $32 million in Russia. Hallik himself hastened to get rid of the assets that led to the scandal and a sharp drop in Callas' rating — according to one opinion poll, 69% of Estonians expected her resignation.