US embassy cable - 05BRATISLAVA853

UNCLAS BRATISLAVA 000853 
 
SIPDIS 
 
 
FOR EUR/NCE, INR/B, AND S/ES-O 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV, PINR, PREL, LO 
SUBJECT: NEW MINISTER OF LABOR TAKES OFFICE 
 
REF: BRATISLAVA 815 
 
1.  (U)  Following the resignation of Ludovit Kanik (reftel), 
President Gasparovic approved the appointment of Ms. Iveta 
Radicova as the new Minister of Labor, Social Affairs, and 
Family; she officially took office on October 17.  Prior to 
her appointment as Minister, Radicova was the director of the 
Sociological Institute of the Slovak Academy of Sciences, and 
was executive director of an NGO handling social policies. 
Radicova is the only female member of the cabinet. 
 
BIOGRAPHIC NOTES 
 
2.  (U)  Radicova was born December 7, 1956, in Bratislava. 
She studied sociology at Bratislava's Comenius University 
from 1975 - 1979, and upon graduation worked on family policy 
for the Institute of Sociology of the Slovak Academy of 
Sciences.  She did postdoctoral studies in 1990 at Oxford 
University in the UK, and worked extensively in academia 
during the following decade.  Radicova founded the S.P.A.C.E. 
foundation (an NGO working on social policies) in 1992, which 
she headed until her appointment as Minister.  Radicova was a 
Fulbright Scholar in the United States in 1998-1999, where 
she did research on social justice, human rights, social 
citizenship and social policy at the New School of Social 
Research in New York. 
 
VALLEE 
 
 
NNNN