On 14 June 2019, H.E. Mrs. Ureerat Chareontoh, Ambassador of the Kingdom of Thailand, presided over to the Gratias agit Laureates Award giving ceremony by H.E. Mr. Tomas Petricek, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic, at the Czernin Palace. The Gratias Agit Award (formerly “Jan Masaryk Gratias Agit Award”) has been presented by the Minister of Foreign Affairs for the promotion of the good name of the Czech Republic abroad ever since 1997 in appreciation of prominent personalities and organizations developing activities in nongovernmental fields. This year, Assistant Professor Verita Sriratana, PhD, lecturer of literary studies at the Department of English, Faculty of Arts, was awarded the “Gratias Agit 2019 Award”.

Assistant Professor Verita Sriratana, PhD, the first Thai citizen and the youngest laureate to receive this award, has been nominated in recognition for her contribution to the teaching of and research on Czech culture, history, literature and politics, for her Thai translation of Bohumil Hrabal’s Too Loud a Solitude, for her Thai theatrical adaptation of Jaroslav Hašek’s The Good Soldier Švejk and for her promotion as well as organisation of Czech arts & culture activities in Thailand.