Czechs mark 40th anniversary of Soviet-led invasion
Czechs are marking the 40th anniversary of the Soviet-led Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia, which crushed the reform movement known as the Prague Spring.
In the early hours of August 21st of 1968, NATO calls on Russia to withdraw troops from Georgia ...
Czech president undergoes successful hip joint operation ... Soviet tanks rolled across the border taking over all key institutions. Disbelieving Czechs took to the streets to defend their capital. Over 100 people were killed and more than 500 injured in the clash with foreign troops. The public revolt was suppressed and the invasion marked the beginning of a dark period of Czech history. Thousands of people fled the country, and thousands lost their jobs or faced persecution for speaking their minds, as communist hardliners regained their grip on power.
Czech and Slovak leaders meet to mark anniversary
Czech President Vaclav Klaus and Slovak President Ivan Gasparovic met in the Slovak capital Bratislava on Thursday to mark the 1968 anniversary. They told reporters that the Soviet-led invasion fully revealed the tragedy and irrationality of the communist era. Here in Prague, Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek met with his Slovak counterpart Robert Fico. Mr. Topolanek said the 1968 invasion was a tragic event but also a valuable lesson which should motivate the country’s political leaders to make sure history did not repeat itself. The Czechoslovak federation broke up shortly after the fall of communism and the two counties are now going their separate ways, although they have retained close ties.
Commemorative ceremony outside Czech Radio building
A commemorative ceremony was held outside the Czech Radio building on Thursday where a fierce battle for control of the radio took place forty years ago. Fifteen civilians lost their lives in the clash with Soviet troops, who eventually seized the building. Broadcasting continued from a number of secret locations for a few days longer, informing Czechs about what was happening and that the invasion had been condemned by the international community.
President Klaus says Russia is not a threat
President Klaus said in an interview for the Russian daily Kommersant that the Czech government’s plans to host a US radar base on Czech soil were not directed against Russia. Mr. Klaus said that he did not think that in the present day Russia posed a security threat to the Czech Republic and emphasized that Prague and Moscow were not enemies. The Czech president said that it was wrong to portray Moscow as a potential aggressor.
The statement came just a day after an opinion poll indicated that 41 percent of Czechs still believe the Czech Republic has reason to fear Russia. In a poll conducted in connection with the anniversary, two thirds of Czechs said they did not think Russia was a democratic country and forty percent of respondents said Moscow was to blame for the military conflict with Georgia.
Czechoslovak leadership received last-minute warnings of the invasion
Archive materials which are now in the hands of the Czech Foreign Ministry indicate that the Czechoslovak leadership received two last-minute warnings of the planned invasion. One came from the Czechoslovak embassy in Hungary on the basis of an anonymous phone call made at 5 pm on August 20th. At 6pm it arrived at the Czechoslovak Foreign Ministry in Prague and was deciphered but it did not reach the president in view of the fact that it was based on an anonymous phone call. A second last-minute warning arrived from Poland, at eight thirty. Historians say that in any case the warnings came too late to make any difference. Some believe that Moscow itself issued many thinly veiled warnings about the use of force which the Czechoslovak leadership disregarded or did not take seriously enough.
Previously unseen photos of invasion published
The Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes has published a collection of photographs of the 1968 invasion which were taken by the Russian KGB and the East German secret service Stasi. The close to two hundred photographs, previously unseen, can be viewed on the institute’s web pages.
Weather
The next few days are expected to be partly cloudy with rain in places and daytime highs reaching 25 degrees Celsius.
(radio-Prague)
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