Dalia Grybauskait Biography, Life, Interesting Facts

Childhood And Early Life

Dalia Grybauskaite was born on the 1 March 1956 in Vilnius.

Education

Dalia Grybauskaite did her schooling at Vilnius Salom?ja N?ris Secondary School followed by a degree in political economy from Leningrad University in 1983. In 1988 she was awarded a doctorate in economics from the Moscow Academy of Public Sciences. She did a six-month programme for senior executives at Georgetown University in Washington in 1992. And in 1993 the Research Council of Lithuania awarded her a doctorate in social sciences.

Early Career

Dalia Grybauskaite worked at the Academy of Sciences as a scientific secretary in 1983. From 1983 until 1984 she was head of the agriculture division at Vilnius High Party School and from 1985 until 1990 worked as a lecturer at the Department of Political Economy.

1990s

Dalia Grybauskaite was appointed a scientific secretary at the Lithuanian Institute of Economics under the Ministry of Economics in August 1990. In 1991 she began working as a program director in the Prime Minister’s office. Later in the year, she became Director of the European Department at the Ministry of International Economic Relations. During 1993, she as Director of the Economic Relations Department at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and in 1994, she became Envoy Extraordinary and Minister of Plenipotentiary at the Lithuanian Mission to the EU. Between 1996 and 1999 Grybauskait? was Minister Plenipotentiary at the Lithuanian Embassy in the US.

2000s

Dalia Grybauskaite was Vice Finance Minister from 1999 until 2000, Vice Foreign Minister from 2000 until 2001 and Finance Minister from 2001 until 2004. She was appointed the EU Commissioner responsible for financial programming and budget in 2004. In November 2005 she was elected commissioner of the Year for her work on budget reform for the EU and on the 12 June 2009 she was elected president of Lithuania, and in May 2012, she was re-elected.

Awards And Achievements

Dalia Grybauskaite has won many awards including the Cross of Commander of the Order of the Lithuanian Grand Duke Gediminas (2003), the Order of Vytautas the Great with the Golden Chain (2003), the Royal Norwegian Grand Cross of St. Olav (2011), the Doctor of Humane Letters, Honoris Causa, at Georgetown University in the US (2013), the Golden Victoria Award (2014), the Order of the Republic (Moldova) in 2015 and in May 2016, the Order of the Star of Romania.