Erik Ninn-Hansen

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Erik Ninn-Hansen (12 April 1922 – 20 September 2014) was a Danish politician from the Conservative People’s Party. He served in parliament from 1953 to 1994, representing Sorø and later Fyns.

In government, he held several jobs. He was Defence Minister from 1968 to 1971 and then Finance Minister in 1971. He led his party from 1971 to 1974, but the party’s results were weak in the early 1970s. In the 1980s, under Prime Minister Poul Schlüter, Ninn-Hansen was Justice Minister from 1982 to 1989.

As Justice Minister, he abused his power by illegally delaying family reunification applications for relatives of Tamil refugees. When this Tamil Case came to light in 1989, he resigned as a minister and later also stepped down as Speaker of the Folketing (the Danish parliament).

An independent inquiry led by a Supreme Court judge investigated the affair and played a key role in the fall of the government in 1993. In 1995 Ninn-Hansen was impeached for abuse of power and received a four-month suspended prison sentence on three counts.

In 2007 another controversy arose around alleged attempts to slow actions in a case involving Palestinian prisoners and a large cash transfer connected to Danish police investigations. A 2009 report concluded that France and Denmark had quietly agreed not to prosecute the prisoners and that Ninn-Hansen’s actions were within his discretion, though the issue prompted ongoing debate.

Ninn-Hansen died in 2014 at the age of 92. He was born in Skørpinge, married to Astrid Pedersen (they had two children), and spent decades in Danish politics.