Prague - Former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright denied on Monday in an interview for news site iHNed.cz that she was ready to replace Richard Graber as US ambassador to the Czech Republic.

"I love the Czech Republic, I was born in Czechoslovakia but I do not know where you got that information," Albright told iHNed.cz.

Czech daily Právo reported on Monday morning that Albright was a hot candidate for the post. The paper cited unnamed diplomatic sources and US media.

Petr Kolář, Czech ambassador to the US, told the paper that Albright did not aspire to the ambassadorial job, but was ready to take it should the government of President-elect Barack Obama ask her to do so.

Albright, a Czech native and former US secretary of state in Bill Clinton's government, endorsed Senator Hillary Clinton in her presidential campaign earlier this year and has advised to Obama on foreign policy.

Czech roots

Albright was born in Czechoslovakia in 1937 as Marie Korbelová and emigrated with her family to the US after the Communists took power in 1948. Her father, Josef Korbel, was a founding dean of the Graduate School of International Studies at the University of Denver; he taught future Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.

Under President Bill Clinton's first administration Madelein Korbel Albright served as the US ambassador to the UN and during Clinton's second term was the first woman to hold the post of the US secretary of state.

Still active in international affairs as a consultant and as a professor at Georgetown University, Albright maintains close ties with the Czech Republic. She rejected Václav Havel's suggestion that she might replace him as the Czech president in 2002.

Albright is fluent in English, Czech, French and Russian.