Ulysse Ellian
Ulysse Ellian (born 17 September 1988) is an Afghan-born Dutch lawyer and politician. He has been a member of the House of Representatives since the 2021 general election on behalf of the conservative-liberal People's Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD). Ellian also served as a municipal councilor in Almere in the years 2018–21. Early life and legal career. He was born in 1988 in the Afghan capital Kabul as the son of Afshin Ellian, an Iranian law professor, poet, and critic of political Islam. His father had fled the Iranian regime and had met Ellian 's mother in Afghanistan. His family came to the Netherlands in 1989, and Ellian grew up with his younger sister in Tilburg and Almere. He studied legal theory at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and became a teacher and researcher specialized in private law at the university after his graduation in 2011. Ellian also started working as a lawyer, and he served as a staff member of the parliamentary inquiry into the failed high-speed rail service Fyra between 2013 and 2015. Politics. Ellian was elected to the Almere municipal council in the 2018 municipal elections as the VVD's second  candidate after he had assisted the party's caucus in Almere since 2014. He succeeded Hilde van Garderen as the VVD's caucus leader when Van Garderen became an alderwoman two months after the March 2018 election. Ellian received security protection in 2019 after he had condemned the alleged role of the Iranian government in the murder of Mohammad-Reza Kolahi, who had been accused by Iran of having been involved in the Hafte Tir bombing in 1981 and lived in Almere under a false identity. Criminal Naoufal F. filed a disciplinary complaint against Ellian in February 2020, because Ellian  had said in an "EenVandaag" episode that F. had been responsible for Kolahi's murder on behalf of the Iranian government as Ridouan Taghi's right-hand man. F. had been convicted of organizing the murder but the case was on appeal. Ellian responded that he had not told any falsehoods, and he called the complaint "unacceptable intimidation of a politician". The Almere municipal council unanimously passed a motion supporting Ellian, and the disciplinary council declared the complaint unfounded in May. House of Representatives. Ellian ran for member of parliament in the March 2021 general election, being placed 22nd on  the VVD's party list. He vacated his seat in the Almere municipal council eight days after the election. Ellian was elected to the House with 1,931 preference votes and was sworn in on 31 March. His focus is in on justice, law, constitutional matters, and antisemitism (formerly also the parliamentary inquiry into childcare benefits), and he is on the Committees for Defence, for European Affairs, for the Interior, and for Justice and Security as well as on the Credentials Committee. Personal life. Ellian is a resident of Almere. His girlfriend, Lesley van Hilten, used to be an assistant of  the CDA caucus in the Almere municipal council and switched to the VVD in 2021. They have a daughter, who was born in 2021, and Ellian also raises his girlfriend's two sons.