Henri Simonet

Henri Simonet   (politician)
Born	10 May 1931 Brussels, Belgium
Died	15 February 1996 (Age 64)
Nationality	Belgian
Alma mater	Universite Libre de Bruxelles, Columbia University
Children	Jacques Simonet
Spouse	Marie-Louise Angenet
Member of	Trilateral Commission
Party	Socialist Party (Belgium)
Transatlantic Belgian politician, Bilderberg Steering committee.  Belgium/Minister/Foreign Affairs  In office 1977 - 1980  Egmont Institute/President  In office 1977 - 1983 Preceded by Jean Charles Snoy et d'Oppuers Succeeded by Cecil de Strycker  European Commissioner for Taxation and Energy In office 6 January 1973 - 6 January 1977

Henri François Simonet was a Belgian politician. Of increasingly transatlantic positions, and a member of the Bilderberg steering committee, he wrote a working paper on A European's Thoughts on the State of the Alliance for the 1982 Bilderberg. From 1977-1983 Simonet worked as the President of the Egmont Institute.

Background

Born in Brussels, Henri Simonet studied law and economics at the Universite Libre de Bruxelles and then went to Columbia University as CRB Graduate Fellow.

Career

Simonet began his political life as a member of the Socialist Party (PS). He was mayor of Anderlecht between 1966 and 1984, succeeding the long-serving Joseph Bracops. Like Bracops, Simonet dominated the local political scene to such an extent that the ambitious Philippe Moureaux moved to neighbouring Molenbeek-Saint-Jean to pursue a career there. In 1985 Simonet left the Socialists to join the Liberal Reformist Party (PRL) where he espoused increasingly transatlantic positions.

As mayor of Anderlecht, Simonet presided over considerable changes to what had been a largely industrial and working class community, attracting new development in the form of the Erasmus Hospital, a teaching hospital tied to the ULB on whose administrative council Simonet served. Christian D'Hoogh succeeded Simonet as mayor of Anderlecht.

In January 1972, Simonet became Minister of Economic Affairs in the Gaston Eyskens government. Together with Secretary General of the Ministry of Economy André Baeyens, he concluded a secret agreement with the Shah's Iran on the construction of an Iranian oil refinery in Belgium, on the border of Limburg and Liège. The intention was that a pipeline network would be built through Flanders and Wallonia with branches to neighboring countries, creating an Iranian gasoline network in Belgium. Henri Simonet signed a convention with the Iranian government on the establishment of the refinery on 21 december 1972 on behalf of the Belgian government. On April 18, 1973, the issue grew into a scandal, the so-called Ibramco affair, when journalist Leo Schrooten revealed that the agreement was concluded without the knowledge of the Belgian government and primarily served the interests of the Belgian Socialist Party. Moreover, the agreement was very vague, and in the end the project never got off the ground.

Simonet was vice-chairman of the European Commission from 1973 to 1977 and Minister for Regional Economic Development in 1978 and 1979. In February 1974, he took part in the International Energy Conference in Washington. It was then that he observed the limits of EU solidarity faced with the situation provoked by the oil embargo and the weight of national interests. In spite of France’s reluctance, he would succeed in connecting the Commission to the work of the International Energy Agency so that, in case of a crisis in supplies, the measures which would be decided there would be applied in the Community.

On the national plan, Simonet was Minister of Foreign Affairs and before as Minister of Economics Affairs. He was unofficial candidate for the post of Secretary General of NATO. He was involved in a political and financial scandal, through his wife Marie-Louise Angenet, in a case of arms sales to the junta governments of Argentina and Uruguay. The scandal was revealed by the weekly magazine Pour, which devoted its last three issues before it closed in 1982 to a complete dossier entitled "the Simonet connection". According to the magazine, which published numerous photocopies of confidential documents, the wife of the then Minister of Foreign Affairs, Marie Louise Simonet-Angenet, was appointed at the end of 1977 CEO of the Brussels company of Auto Transport (BAT), manufacturer of the BDX armored car, whose characteristics make it also ideal to suppress riots.

After PS president André Cools stopped giving Simonet a ministerial post in 1980, he came into more and more conflict with his party, where he was part of the right-wing and transatlantic wing. He was also a supporter of a unitary Belgium, which caused him to become more and more isolated within the Federalist-minded PS. In October 1983, Simonet stepped down from the PS faction in the chamber because he disagreed with his party's stance on the missile issue. Simonet was an unconditional defender of the NATO double decision to deploy US nuclear missiles in Florennes, while his party strongly opposed it. As a result, Simonet was also removed from the PS party office and the party requested that he relinquish his political mandates. In April 1984 he first left Anderlecht's municipal politics and in May 1984 he resigned as an MP.

Family

His son Jacques Simonet, who made his political career in the liberal Liberal Reformist Party, served twice as Minister-President of the Brussels-Capital Region (1999-2000; 2004) and as mayor of Anderlecht from 2000 until his death in 2007.

 

Events Participated in

Event	Start	End	Location(s)	Description
Bilderberg/1967	31 March 1967	2 April 1967	United Kingdom St John's College (Cambridge) UK	Possibly the only Bilderberg meeting held in a university college rather than a hotel (St. John's College, Cambridge)
Bilderberg/1971	23 April 1971	25 April 1971	US Vermont Woodstock Woodstock Inn	The 20th Bilderberg, 89 guests
Bilderberg/1975	25 April 1975	27 April 1975	Turkey Golden Dolphin Hotel Cesme	The 24th Bilderberg Meeting, 98 guests
Bilderberg/1977	22 April 1977	24 April 1977	United Kingdom Imperial Hotel Torquay	The 25th Bilderberg, held in Torquay, England.
Bilderberg/1979	27 April 1979	29 April 1979	Austria Baden Clubhotel Schloss Weikersdorf	27th Bilderberg, 95 guests, Austria
Bilderberg/1980	18 April 1980	20 April 1980	Germany Aachen	The 28th Bilderberg, held in West Germany, unusually exposed by the Daily Mirror
Bilderberg/1982	14 May 1982	16 May 1982	Norway Sandefjord	The 30th Bilderberg, held in Norway.

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