Urmas Paet has been a Member of the European Parliament since November 2014. He specialises in foreign and security policy issues. He is the Vice-Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee, a member of the Subcommittee on Human Rights as well as a substitute member of the Security and Defence Committee and the Tourism and Transport Committee. He is the rapporteur of the European Defence Union Report, the EU Arctic Policy Report, the Cyber Defence Report, the Report on the State of EU Cyber Defence Capabilities and the report on the Recommendation to the Council Taking Stock of the Functioning of the EEAS and for a Stronger EU in the world. Paet is the European Parliament's standing rapporteur for the Arctic region. In November 2019, he founded the Arctic Friendship Group and serves as the Chair of the group.
Before joining the European Parliament, Urmas Paet was the Minister for Foreign Affairs of Estonia for almost ten years. Urmas Paet has also served as a Minister of Culture and as the Head of the Nõmme City district in Tallinn. He majored in Political Science and started out as a journalist in Estonian Radio and daily newspaper Postimees.