He is the Executive Director of Vaclav Havel Library in Prague and former President of Aspen Institute Central Europe (2012-2015). Previously he was the Ambassador of the Czech Republic to the United Kingdom (2009-2015), to Israel (2003- 2009) and to the United States (1992-1997). In 1989 he was a founding member of the Czech chapter of P.E.N., the international organization of writers and translators that was banned in Czechoslovakia during the Communist era. In November 1989 he was a founding member of the Civic Forum, an umbrella organization that coordinated the overthrow of the Communist regime. In January 1990 he became the Spokesman and Press Secretary for President Václav Havel. In 1996 he was elected to the Senate of the Parliament of the Czech Republic and served as the chairman of its Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defense and Security. Žantovský studied psychology at Charles University in Prague and at McGill University in Montreal, Canada and worked as a research psychologist. Beginning in 1980. He was a contributor to the samizdat press and the Prague correspondent for Reuters. In 2003 he co-founded the new Prague-based think tank Program of Atlantic Security Studies (PASS) and served as its first Executive Director. In 2014 he published to wide acclaim the biography of the former president Havel: A Life in English, Czech and several other languages
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