ion, and a former Reuters correspondent, is currently a member of Senate and a head of its Foreign Committee. Before he served as Ambassador to the United States in 1992-1996, he was a spokesman for President of the now-defunct Czechoslovakia, Vaclav Havel. As the ODA chairman he replaced Jan Kalvoda, who resigned last December. The ODA is one of the three major rightist groupings that emerged from the Civic Forum, which helped overthrow Communist rule in the 1989 "Velvet Revolution". The ODA has 13 members of the 200-seat parliament and three ministers.