Eduard Raul Hellvig (born 27 October 1974) is a Romanian political scientist, journalist and politician who has served as director of the Romanian Intelligence Service (SRI) since 2015. A former member of the National Liberal Party (PNL) and previously of the Conservative Party (PC), he represented Bihor County in the Romanian Chamber of Deputies from 2004 to 2008, and sat for Ilfov County from 2012 to 2013. In the Victor Ponta cabinet, he was Minister of Regional Development and Tourism in 2012. During 2007, he was Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for Romania, a position he once again took up in 2013, and which he left upon becoming SRI director. Biography Born in Zalău, he attended Babeș-Bolyai University from 1993 to 1997, graduating with a degree in Political Science. In 2009, he received a doctorate in the same field from the National School of Political Science and Public Administration. From 1997 to 1998, he worked as a stockbroker; during that time, he was also present on the editorial staff for Stelian Tănase's Sfera Politicii magazine. In 1999–2000, during the Romanian Democratic Convention cabinet, he worked as a Chief of Staff for Interior Minister . In 2000, he was on the Presidential campaign team of that cabinet's final prime minister, Mugur Isărescu. From 2001 to 2003 he headed a polling firm, and in 2004 he became director of Sintezis, an information technology company. In 2005, together with Zsolt Szilágyi and others, Hellvig was nominated as a member of Generația Așteptată ("The Awaited Generation"), a project which took inspiration from a campaign in the newspaper Cotidianul, and which sought to evidence and nominate the valuable young contributors to Romanian society. Hellvig entered the Romanian Humanist Party (PUR), as the PC was then called, in 2003, and served as interim head of its Bihor County chapter from 2004 to 2005. Elected to the Chamber in 2004, he served, from 2005 to 2008, on its defense committee. He crossed to the PNL in September 2008, and served as its secretary general from 2011 to 2014. From January to November 2007, he was a Member of the European Parliament. At the 2008 election, he ran for re-election to the Chamber, but was defeated. Subsequently, he became a close ally of PNL leader Crin Antonescu. In May 2012, Hellvig was named Regional Development and Tourism Minister in the new Ponta cabinet, serving until December. Elected