Rafael Bielsa

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Image:Rafael Bielsa.jpg Rafael Antonio Bielsa (born February 15 1953) is an Argentine politician from Rosario, province of Santa Fe.

In 1977 during the Dirty War, suspected of being a member of the montoneros radical guerrilla group, Bielsa was detained and taken to the "El Castillo" (also known as "El Fortín") illegal detention centre, where he spent two months of questioning and torture.

After a period in Spain, he returned to Argentina in 1980, and started working in different positions of the military government, mainly in the Ministry of Justice.

Upon the return to democracy in 1983, Bielsa worked in a Secretariat of the Ministry of Education in different functions, then in the 1990s at the Presidency and other specific international projects, and then as assessor at the Ministry of Justice, as well as other posts.

Bielsa was the foreign minister of Argentina since 2003-05-25, when President Néstor Kirchner took office, and until 2005-12-06. In the 2005 legislative elections he won a seat in the Argentine Chamber of Deputies, representing the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires. At the last moment (just before the inauguration ceremony), after a request by the President, he chose not to take office, instead accepting an appointment to become Ambassador in France; however, the next day he retracted (citing moral qualms and the pressure from public opinion as the reason) and decided to occupy his legislative seat after all. Both decissions were heavily criticized by the opposition and political analysts in the media; the latter one was also qualified in harsh terms by government supporters themselves.

Rafael Bielsa is the brother of former Argentina national football team coach Marcelo Bielsa; both are well-known Newell's Old Boys supporters.

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