The secretary general of the Estonian Foreign Ministry, Jonatan Vseviov, announced that he would resign and run for parliament in elections due in March 2027, ERR reports. Vseviov will represent the opposition Social Democratic Party (SDE). SDE chairman Lauri Läänemets will propose that Vseviov be nominated as the party’s candidate for prime minister. Läänemets will continue as SDE leader, however. Earlier, Vseviov was floated as a possible candidate for president. Previously, he served as Estonia’s ambassador to the US and secretary general of the Ministry of Defence. He was member of the Estonian Reform Party in 1999-2005.
Meanwhile, Reform’s secretary general, Kristo Enn Vaga, suggested that Vseviov decided to join SDE instead of Reform because he was “somewhat resentful” that Reform did not pick him to replace Hanno Pevkur as defence minister. Nevertheless, Reform’s chairman, Prime Minister Kristen Michal, said that his party would find it easier to work together with SDE if it was led by Vseviov, ERR reported. He said that while Reform and SDE would not agree on economic policy, cooperation was possible on foreign and security policy. Vseviov asserted that Estonia was capable of achieving more in foreign policy and “deserved better,” ERR reported.
Mirko Ojakivi, foreign policy analyst at ERR, said that SDE was trying to position itself as one of the three biggest parties after the parliamentary elections, ERR reported. He noted that Estonian parties had begun recruiting prominent candidates from outside their own ranks, including among senior civil servants. Earlier, former EU commissioner Kadri Simson announced that she was joining SDE and would run for parliament, ERR reported. Simson was a member of the Estonian Centre Party from 1995 to 2024, when she resigned following an internal rift within the party leadership. She was a longtime MP and served as economy minister.