Pavol Demeš is an independent foreign policy analyst, civil society expert and TV anchor based in Bratislava, Slovakia. Prior to the "Velvet Revolution" in November 1989, Demes was a bio-medical researcher at Comenius University in Bratislava. He is a graduate of Charles University in Prague (1980). After democratic changes in 1989 he served as the Executive Director of the Slovak Academic Information Agency-Service Center for the Third Sector. From 1991-92 he was the Slovak Minister of International Relations and he also served as Foreign Policy Advisor to the President of the Slovak Republic (1993-97). Since 2000 until September 2010 he was the Director for Central and Eastern Europe of the German Marshall Fund of the United States.
Now he is non-resident senior transatlantic fellow with GMF US and serves as board member of the European Endowment for Democracy. He has his own TV program on international relations and diplomacy at an internet tasr.tv (within The News Agency of the Slovak Republic - TASR). He published numerous articles and books on international relations and civil society and had many photographic exhibitions in multiple countries.
Selected awards: the EU-US Democracy and Civil Society Award (in 1998), the USAID Democracy and Governance Award (1999), Royal Dutch decoration Knight of the Order of Orange Nassau (2005), Yugoslav Star of First Class (2005), South East Europe Media Organization Human Rights Award (2009), Medal of Honor from the Friends of Slovakia, USA (2011), AIPES Freedom Award (2018), Woodrow Wilson Award (2018), Golden Medal of the Slovak Ministry of Foreign and European Affaires (2019).