After being expelled from the Communist Party, Jaromír Novotný had to unload freight trains despite being an engineer. His father died because of it.
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Born on 24 August 1947 in Ostrava, Jaromír Novotný aspired to a diplomatic career from a young age and had a keen interest in languages and foreign countries. He pursued foreign trade studies at the University of Economics in Prague. In 1967, he joined the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia for pragmatic reasons. During the 1968 invasion, he was in France but chose to return home instead of staying abroad with his then partner, Kateřina Smrkovská. His father-in-law, Josef Smrkovský, was a supporter of the reformist wing of the Communist Party and one of the government members forced to sign the Moscow Protocol in August 1968. The entire family was under State Security surveillance. At the beginning of the ‘Normalization’ era, Jaromír Novotný was expelled from the Communist Party and lost his job. He ended up unloading freight trains at the Household Goods Company as it was the only job available to him. In the mid-1970s, he joined the Engineering and Design Company. After years of futile applications, he finally got an opportunity to travel to the USA in 1978. Although he understood that the regime hoped for his emigration, he chose not to leave. He found employment at a shoe store in Prague and worked in sales until 1989. Over time, he rose from a salesman to a sales deputy. His son Ondřej Novotný participated in the events on Národní Třída (National Square) in Prague. Later, he joined the Czech Ministry of Defense’s Committee for International Relations and was present during negotiations regarding Czechoslovakia’s accession to the European Community. He subsequently worked at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic as Head of the Foreign Relations Section and Deputy Minister. Jaromír Novotný chaired the government team responsible for the Czech Republic’s accession to NATO. At the beginning of the millennium, Jaromír Novotný became the Ambassador to India and later to Japan. Since 2011, he has been retired and has lectured at the Diplomatic Institute. For several years, he served as a staff advisor to Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka. As of 2023, he resided in Prague.
