Ásthildur Lóa Thórsdóttir said in a media interview she had first started a relationship when the boy was 15 years old, and she was a 22-year-old counsellor at a religious group which he attended.

She then gave birth to his child when he was 16 years old and she was 23.

“It’s been 36 years, a lot of things change in that time and I would definitely have dealt with these issues differently today,” the 58-year-old told Icelandic media.

Iceland’s prime minister, Kristrún Frostadóttir, told the press this was “a serious matter”, although she said she knew little more than “the average person”.

“This is a very personal matter [and] out of respect for the person concerned, I will not comment on the substance,” she said.

According to Visir newspaper, Frostadóttir said she had only received confirmation of the story on Thursday night.

She immediately summoned the children’s minister to her office, where she resigned.

Thórsdóttir revealed in an interview with them that she had met the father, who RUV name as Eirík Ásmundsson, while she was working at the religious group Trú og líf (Religion and Life), which he had reportedly joined because of a difficult home life.

He was 15 years old and she was 22 at the time of their meeting. Thórsdóttir gave birth to their son when they were both a year older.

RUV report that the relationship was secret, but that Ásmundsson was present at his child’s birth and spent the first year with him.

However, the news agency writes this changed when Thórsdóttir met her current husband.

They report they have seen documents Ásmundsson submitted to Iceland’s justice ministry requesting access to his son, but that Thórsdóttir denied it, while also requesting – and receiving – child support payments from him over the following 18 years.

A relative of Ásmundsson tried twice to contact the Icelandic prime minister about the relationship last week.

Frostadóttir said last night that when the woman revealed it involved a government minister she asked for more information, which led to the revelation and the resignation.

In her TV interview with RUV last night, Thórsdóttir said she was upset that the woman had contacted the prime minister.

“I understand… what it looks like,” she said, adding that it is “very difficult to get the right story across in the news today”.

While the age of consent in Iceland is 15, it is illegal to have sex with a person under the age of 18 if you are their teacher or mentor, if they are financially dependent on you, or work for you. The maximum sentence for this crime is three years in jail.

Despite resigning from her ministerial job, Thórsdottir said she had no plans to leave parliament.

The conservative Independence Party, which led the outgoing government, won 14 seats with a 19.4 percent vote share, and the centrist Liberal Reform Party won 11 seats and 15.8 percent of the votes. Three other parties also won seats.Icelanders voted on Saturday after disagreements over immigration, energy policy and the economy forced Prime Minister Bjarni Benediktsson to pull the plug on his coalition government and call early elections.This weekend’s results more than doubled the share the Social Democrats won in the previous election in 2021.

“I’m extremely proud of all the work that we’ve done. We obviously see that people want to see changes in the political landscape,” Social Democratic leader Kristrun Mjoll Frostadottir said as results started coming in.

Frostadottir, 36, will likely try to seek coalition partners to command a parliamentary majority.“It very much depends on whether she can convince the president that she is the most likely to be able to form a coalition,” Stefania Oskarsdottir, a political scientist at the University of Iceland, told the Reuters news agency.“It seems that the Reform Party is critical in this because they have the option of joining a coalition with the Social Democrats and the People’s Party, and they also have the option of forming a coalition with the Independence Party and the Centre Party,” Oskarsdottir said.The Pirate Party lost all of its seats in this election, meaning that only six parties will have seats in the new parliament.

Frostadottir has pledged to address the country’s cost of living crisis, which has been caused by inflation and high borrowing costs – a challenge faced by countries worldwide in recent years and a thorn in the side of incumbent parties, including the Democrats in the United States.In February 2023, inflation peaked at 10.4 percent in Iceland. While inflation slowed to 5.1 percent in October, it is still significantly higher than in much of the rest of the world.By comparison, inflation in the US stood at 2.6 percent last month while the European Union’s rate was 2.3 percentPublic finances have also been strained by repeated volcanic eruptions in southwestern Iceland, which have displaced thousands of people. Migration has also been a key issue in this election, as Iceland struggles to accommodate asylum seekers.The number of refugees seeking protection in Iceland jumped to more than 4,000 in each of the past three years, compared with a previous average of fewer than 1,000. Iceland has a population of fewer than 400,000 residents.

With the ballots of more than half of eligible voters counted from Saturday’s snap poll, the Social Democrats had some 21.5 percent of the vote, more than double the share they gained from the last election in 2021, according to broadcaster RUV.

If those results hold, they would beat the ruling Independence Party, which had 19.3 percent of the vote, as well as the Liberal Reform Party, which was at 15.8 percent, according to RUV.

“I’m extremely proud of all the work that we’ve done. We obviously see that people want to see changes in the political landscape,” said the Social Democrats leader Kristrun Frostadottir as results started coming in.

The election comes after disagreements over the economy, immigration and the fallout from volcanic eruptions forced Prime Minister Bjarni Benediktsson to pull the plug on his unlikely left-right coalition government.

On October 13, Benediktsson asked President Halla Tomasdottir to dissolve the Althingi – Iceland’s parliament – and called voters to the polls early.

The general election is the North Atlantic island nation’s sixth since the 2008 financial crisis devastated its economy and ushered in a new era of political instability.

Up for grabs in the election are 63 members of the Althingi, with seats allocated both by regional constituencies and proportional representation. Though 10 parties contested, only those that receive at least 5 percent of the vote will win seats.

That means Iceland’s Left-Green Movement, a member of Benediktsson’s outgoing coalition, could lose all its seats – as it has so far garnered only 2.4 percent of the vote.

The splintering of Iceland’s political landscape came after the 2008 financial crisis, which prompted years of economic upheaval after the country’s debt-swollen banks collapsed.

The crisis led to anger and distrust of the parties that had traditionally traded power back and forth and prompted the creation of new parties ranging from the environment-focused Left-Green Alliance to the Pirate Party, which advocates direct democracy and individual freedoms.

Like many Western countries, Iceland has been buffeted by the rising cost of living and immigration pressures.

Inflation peaked at an annual rate of 10.2 percent in February 2023, prompted by the fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

While inflation slowed to 5.1 percent in October, that is still high compared with neighbouring countries.

The United States inflation rate stood at 2.6 percent last month, while the European Union’s rate was 2.3 percent.

Public finances have also been strained by repeated eruptions of a volcano in the southwestern part of the country, which have displaced thousands of people.