Jiří Novák

"Marek emigrated to France in 1983, where he graduated from the Faculty of Arts. In 1987 he began working for Pavel Tigrid's magazine Testimony (Temoignage). He was with him for two years and simultaneously with the publishing of the magazine he was learning about our political scene. He established contacts with our underground organization, and in 1989 after the Velvet Revolution he returned. Since he knew French perfectly, together with several other languages, he became our ambassador to France. Then he returned, he spent four years here. That's the life of ambassadors, they are out for four years and then they are here for four years. Then he went to Vietnam for for years, because it had been the French territory. He spent four years in Hanoi, then returned and then went to Lebanon to Beirut. He was there for four years, then he returned and went to the United States as a general consul in Chicago. Now he has been in the Czech Republic for a year and a half and he is employed at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs as teh head of the economic section and in two years he should go abroad again as an ambassador."