Magnitsky Awards
Presenter’s Bio

Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger is a German politician, a former member of the Free Democratic Party and a prominent advocate of human rights in Germany and Europe.

Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger was a member of the German Bundestag from 1990 to 2013. She also served as Federal Minister of Justice of Germany from 1992 to 1996 in the cabinet of Helmut Kohl and again in the second Merkel cabinet from 2009 to 2013.

Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger was also active in the Council of Europe. From 2003 to 2009 she was a member of the German delegation at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. As a member of the Council of Europe’s Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights, she conducted an investigative trip to Russia and authored a critical report on the country’s judicial system.

In addition to her mandate as a member of the German parliament, she has worked as a lawyer in Munich since 1997.

Since 2014, Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger continues to be a frequent commentator on human rights and data protection in German media.

Since 2018 she is the deputy chairwoman of the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom and since 2019 a non-judicial constitutional judge in Bavaria.