Coffee with the Ambassador of the Czech Republic
The Ambassador of the Czech Republic, Janina Hřebíčková, is a true Czech heroine.
She began her career at the age of 25, when she walked the streets of Prague alongside half a million people, doing her best to overthrow communism and the authoritarian system.
“You are 25 and you hope that everything will soon be over. You are not afraid, you don’t think about it because there is this hunger for freedom and that hunger is so great and goes so deep that you don’t think at all about how the army, police, or secret police will react. During those months in 1989, all of us there knew that a new life was ahead of us,” recalls the Ambassador of the Czech Republic.
During the event “Coffee with the Ambassador of the Czech Republic” held at Europe House, Hřebíčková spoke about her career path, and her experiences working in diplomacy and numerous international organisations and institutions such as the United Nations, USAID, and UNESCO.
Her work also took her to five war zones in three continents where she gained great knowledge:
“I learned that love is universal but so is evil. For me, people are divided into good and bad, and there are no other differences between us. It is that simple, and it does not matter whether you are in the Far or Near East, Africa, Asia, South and North America, or Europe, people are the same everywhere and have either good or bad intentions.”
Ambassador Hřebíčková was a witness to the difficult period in the Balkans during the 1990s. While speaking about the changes that occurred over the years and about the state of the Western Balkans today, the Ambassador said:
“After Kosovo, I went to Montenegro, from Montenegro, I went to Serbia. Compared to what I have witnessed then, there has been an enormous change. Today, we face different problems and challenges, but I would be lying if I said that the situation has worsened. In my humble opinion, the situation is much better, especially when it comes to awareness, people are more open to critical thinking, fighting for women’s rights, the rights of the elderly, and the rights of the LGBTIQ+ community.”
The Ambassador hopes that in the future of the Western Balkans, students and younger generations will want to stay here. She hopes they will have a reason to stay.
“I would like young people to be given bigger and better chances so that they can show us, the older generation, that things can be done differently,” Hřebíčková concluded.
As part of the event “Coffee with the Ambassador of the Czech Republic,” the exhibition of portraits named Czech Heroines was opened. You can visit this exhibition until 15 June at Europe House.