Svenn Thorkild Stray is a retired Norwegian

Norway

Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...

 politician active in the Conservative Party of Norway

Conservative Party of Norway

The Conservative Party is a Norwegian political party. The current leader is Erna Solberg. The party was since the 1920s consistently the second largest party in Norway, but has been surpassed by the growth of the Progress Party in the late 1990s and 2000s...

 and former foreign minister of Norway.

Stray's parents were Gudmund Stray (1885-1970), a dentist, and Anne Johanne Marie Frøstrup (1893-1975). Svenn Stray graduated from the University of Oslo

University of Oslo

The University of Oslo , formerly The Royal Frederick University , is the oldest and largest university in Norway, situated in the Norwegian capital of Oslo. The university was founded in 1811 and was modelled after the recently established University of Berlin...

 with a law degree in 1941. After having served as a clerk in Moss, Norway

Moss, Norway

is a coastal city and a municipality in Østfold county, Norway. The administrative centre of the municipality is the town of Moss. The city of Moss was established as a municipality on 1 January 1838...

, he opened his own practice in Moss in 1950.

Political career

Stray was first elected to local office in Moss in 1955, and he remained active in local politics until 1979. He was elected to Stortinget in 1958. He served continuously in the parliament until 1985, for a total of 27 years, 264 days.

Stray was foreign minister twice, from 1970 to 1971, and 1981 to 1986.