Carlo Azeglio Ciampi

Carlo Azeglio Ciampi (Italian: [ˈkarlo adˈdzeʎʎo ˈtʃampi] ; 9 December 1920 – 16 September 2016) was an Italian politician, statesman and banker who was the president of Italy from 1999 to 2006 and prime minister of Italy from 1993 to 1994.

A World War II veteran, Ciampi had fought for the Italian resistance movement after he evaded capture from the Wehrmacht in 1943. Afterwards, he became a prominent banker in the First Italian Republic, gradually rising in the ranks of the Bank of Italy before becoming its governor in 1979. In his tenure as governor, the Italian lira was devalued amid conflict with Prime Minister Bettino Craxi in the mid-1980s, and Italy withdrew from the European Monetary System in 1992. Besides his political career, he held numerous intergovernmental positions, including as Chairman of the Interim Committee of the International Monetary Fund from 1998 to 1999.

Following the Tangentopoli scandal that precipitated the collapse of the First Republic, Ciampi, who was politically independent, was asked to become Prime Minister by President Oscar Luigi Scalfaro in April 1993, which he accepted. His short tenure was mainly characterised by addressing political corruption uncovered by Tangentopoli, before Silvio Berlusconi's win in the 1994 election ushered in the Second Republic. He would then serve as Minister of the Treasury from 1996 to 1999 in the First Prodi and First D'Alema governments during the country's transition into the eurozone, for which he chose Leonardo da Vinci's Vitruvian Man for the design of the one euro coin.

Ciampi succeeded Scalfaro as President of Italy in the 1999 Italian presidential election, and held the office for seven years until his resignation in May 2006. His broad, unifying rhetoric and non–interventionist role as head of state meant he retained the role's largely ceremonial powers. However, his relationship with Berlusconi in the latter's second and third governments was often strained, publicly opposing Italian military involvement in the Iraq War in 2003 and opposing Berlusconi regarding the resignation of Minister of Foreign Affairs Renato Ruggiero in 2002. He enjoyed high approval ratings by the Italian public throughout his presidency and was well regarded in Italian politics, but chose not to run for re–election in 2006, and was succeeded by Giorgio Napolitano, whose interventionist approach shifted the role of the Presidency.