Sobotka (senior ruling Civic Democrats, ODS), who gave the mains speech during the ceremony, said people should consider the risk of a similar tragedy being repeated. "Human pain was confronted with human heartlessness," said Sobotka, recalling the Lidice massacre. He at the same time criticised an indifferent stance on the current world conflicts. "Evil committed by someone at the other end of our planet is dangerously close to us in the current globalised world.
After paying homage to the victims, we must take it into consideration whether a similar tragedy can happed again," Sobotka added. A series of speeches culminated with the words of Andela Dvorakova, chairwoman of the Czech Association of Freedom Fighters. She recalled that the whole world had Sixty percent of Czech roads pose high risk - press ...
After Heydrich: demonstrations for and against the Reich ...
New Lidice education centre offers detailed catalogue of Nazi horrors ... been shattered by the Lidice tragedy. To keep Lidice alive, many villages all over the world bear its name, she added. Hundreds of people took past in the commemorative event at the grave of the Lidice men today. After wreath-laying and speeches, the "Light for Lidice" national festival of children's choirs started on the scene. It presents choirs from all 14 Czech regions as well as guest choir from Norway. The exhibition "Light for Televag" presenting the Norwegian fisherman's village that had a similar fate as Lidice during the war was opened in the Lidice Memorial on Friday. Representatives of the opposition Communists (KSCM), including their chairman Vojtech Filip, will meet in Lidice this afternoon. The Young Communists association organise a Prague-Lidice march on this occasion. Lidice, a village with some 500 inhabitants was razed to the ground on June 10, 1942 under the pretext that its inhabitants collaborated with the Czechoslovak paratroopers who took part in the assassination of German Reichsprotektor Reinhard Heydrich. The Lidice men (173) were executed, the women and children were sent to concentration camps, while some of the children were selected for re-education in Germany. A total of 340 village inhabitants Lidice were killed. After the war, only 143 women and 17 children returned to Lidice.
(Ceske Noviny)
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