Holger Kirkholm Nielsen, known as Holger K. Nielsen (born 23 April 1950), is a
Minister for Foreign Affairs for 49 days from December 2013 through January 2014. He was the leader of the Socialist People's Party from 1991 to 2005 and served as the Minister for Taxation
He was elected to the Danish Parliament in 1987.[2] He became leader of the Socialist People's Party in 1991[2] at a time when the party was going through some major ideological soul-searching following the collapse of socialism in Eastern Europe. The opposing candidate for the party leadership was Steen Gade,[2] a self-styled moderniser intent on reforming the party in ways which the majority found too radical. Holger K. Nielsen was considered a 'safer' choice in the eyes of the party's old guard, and thus assumed the leadership allied to the more leftist elements in his party.
Among the policies that had to be addressed was the party's approach to European integration. Having opposed membership of the
EC (EU) in 1972, and then campaigned against ratification of the Single European Act in 1986, the party had by the late 1980s grudgingly reconciled itself to Danish membership, dropping the demand for withdrawal in 1990. However when the Maastricht Treaty came up for approval by referendum in 1992 the party remained true to its roots and recommended a 'NO' vote. Holger K. Nielsen became one of the leaders in this campaign,[2] and was later judged to have swung far more than his own socialist voters towards the NO-side, which to great surprise emerged victorious by a wafer-thin margin. The following year, however, he reversed that position, recommending acceptance of the Maastricht Treaty, supplemented with the four Danish opt-outs
. This decision came close to tearing the party apart, with some 60% of its voters remaining opposed, but this time the yes-side prevailed.
During the years of the
1998 election
.
The party was successful in shoring up the centre-left governments of the 1990s. The party remained in the sceptic camp during the
Nice Treaty, thus making a referendum avoidable. This was the opening shot in a campaign to turn the formerly EU-sceptic party into pro-Europeans, a process that culminated in late 2004, with the party's rank-and-file following Holger K. Nielsen's advice, and endorsing a pro-ratification stance towards the EU's Draft Constitution.[citation needed
]
Following the
liberal-conservative coalition
, the Socialist People's Party found themselves in opposition.
After the
2005 parliamentary election, Holger K. Nielsen resigned as party leader.[2]
When
Minister of Foreign Affairs in the same cabinet until 30 January 2014, when the Socialist People's Party left the coalition and the Thorning-Schmidt II Cabinet
was inaugurated.
Nielsen is in his second marriage and has four children, two from each of the marriages.[1]
