‘I wish both Václav Bartuška and Petr Gandalovič every success in their future endeavours and I am glad that they will represent us in these destinations,’ said Foreign Minister Jan Lipavský on the appointment. Both of them have already received agrément, i.e. approval to serve in the host country. 

Václav Bartuška started working for Czech diplomacy in 1999 and until 2001 was the Commissioner General of the Czech participation in the World Expo 2000 in Hanover. Since 2006, he has served as Ambassador-at-Large for Energy Security at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. From 2010 to 2014 he served as the Government Plenipotentiary for the Expansion of the Temelín Nuclear Power Plant. He lectures at Czech and foreign universities and is the author of Polojasno, a book about the work of the parliamentary commission of inquiry into the State Security crackdown on Národní třída on 17th November 1989.  

Petr Gandalovič joined the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1994 and was successively Advisor to the Minister and in 1995-1997 Director-General  of the Economic and Information Section. From 1997-2002 he was the head of the Consulate General of the Czech Republic in New York. Subsequently, he served as Mayor of Ústí nad Labem, Minister of Regional Development in 2006 and Minister of Agriculture in 2007-2009. In 2011, he returned to Czech diplomacy, serving as Ambassador to the United States of America from 2011-2016, and for the next five years he headed the Permanent Mission of the Czech Republic to the OECD in Paris. For the last three years, he has been heading the Department of Development Cooperation and Humanitarian Aid at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.  

Václav Bartuška will take up his post in London during the summer of 2025, while Petr Gandalovič will leave for Zagreb at the beginning of 2026.