Inguss Kalniņš has taken up the position of Advisor to the Minister of Foreign Affairs on public administration and international and European Union legal matters. He is a lawyer with more than 20 years of experience in European and international law, public administration, and diplomacy.
Inguss Kalniņš earned his bachelor’s degree in law from the Faculty of Law at the University of Latvia (2004) and his master’s degree in European Studies from the Faculty of Economics and Management at the University of Latvia (2006). He continued his studies in the United States at Tufts University’s Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, where he completed a master’s programme in law and diplomacy (2009–2011), and also taught courses on international law and diplomacy at the university’s continuing education centre.
He began his professional career at the Constitutional Court as a judicial assistant (2001–2003), after which he worked at the Ministry of Justice in the field of European and international law. Following Latvia’s accession to the European Union, he served as a legal advisor in the Department for the Coordination of European Affairs, and from 2006 to 2009 as the Ministry of Justice’s legal attaché at Latvia’s Permanent Representation to the European Union in Brussels. In 2011, Inguss Kalniņš became director of the Court of Justice of the European Union Department at the Ministry of Justice, and the Cabinet of Ministers appointed him as Latvia’s representative to the Court of Justice of the European Union. While continuing to serve in that capacity, he worked as Deputy State Secretary on Strategy Issues at the Ministry of Justice beginning in 2012. In addition to his professional duties, he served as a visiting lecturer at Riga Graduate School of Law on the bachelor’s and master’s programmes in EU law.
Inguss Kalniņš also gained international experience as a high-level advisor on legal affairs for the European Union in Chișinău, Moldova (2016–2018). Upon his return to Latvia, he served as an advisor to the President of the Constitutional Court (2019–2022), served on the Council of Independent Experts on International and European Law at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and from December 2022 to May 2026 served as an advisor to the Minister of Justice.
Inguss Kalniņš joined the Minister of Foreign Affairs’ team on 15 June 2026.
Inguss Kalniņš is also a lieutenant and commander of a company in the 13th Infantry Battalion of the National Guard.