He became a member of the Communist Party of Greece, rising to its Central Committee, before eventually joining the PASOK socialist party during the Metapolitefsi.
He was elected for the first time as an MP in the 1981 general election with PASOK and has been continuously re-elected since until 2012.

In 1996 he was appointed Minister for Foreign Affairs and held the post until his resignation in 1999, in the aftermath of the scandal involving the Kurdish nationalist leader, Abdullah Öcalan: helped by individual members of the Greek intelligence agencies Öcalan entered Greece illegally and was then deported to Kenya, where he was captured by Turkish agents after leaving the Greek embassy at Nairobi.

He was briefly made Minister for Culture in 2000, an appointment which was widely criticized, in view of his previous statement that artists who had protested his handling of the Öcalan affair were kuradomanges (turd tough guys).
He became a member of the Communist Party of Greece, rising to its Central Committee, before eventually joining the PASOK socialist party during the Metapolitefsi. He was elected for the first time as an MP in the 1981 general election with PASOK and has been continuously re-elected since until 2012.
In 1996 he was appointed Minister for Foreign Affairs and held the post until his resignation in 1999, in the aftermath of the scandal involving the Kurdish nationalist leader, Abdullah Öcalan: helped by individual members of the Greek intelligence agencies Öcalan entered Greece illegally and was then deported to Kenya, where he was captured by Turkish agents after leaving the Greek embassy at Nairobi.
He was briefly made Minister for Culture in 2000, an appointment which was widely criticized, in view of his previous statement that artists who had protested his handling of the Öcalan affair were kuradomanges (turd tough guys).
Theodoros Pangalos (politician)