"Only Belgrade reacted to Soviet invasion"

Vaclav Klaus reminded the West that when the Soviets invaded in 1968, only Yugoslavia mobilized its army in response.

Izvor: Beta

Friday, 22.08.2008.

17:57

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Vaclav Klaus reminded the West that when the Soviets invaded in 1968, only Yugoslavia mobilized its army in response. During the commemoration of 40 years since the Soviet occupation of Czechoslovakia, the Czech president said that the West reacted to the occupation only with angry words. "Only Belgrade reacted to Soviet invasion" “It is interesting after the Balkan tragedies of the 1990s, to remember that the only country that reacted to the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia with a mobilization of its armed forces was Yugoslavia,” Klaus said. He said that while the West "reacted with nothing but words", in reality, "it sound almost like it was coming from Brezhnev – that is your business, nothing will change with the division of the world based into spheres of influence, agreed upon in Yalta,” the Czech president told the gathering in Prague. Klaus said at the beginning of his speech that the Czechs should not blame the Russians for that tragic August 21, 1968, when 200,000 Soviet, Hungarian, Polish, Bulgarian and East German tanks suffocated the reform attempts of the Prague Spring. “The invasion was led by the Soviet totalitarian government that took the most responsibility for it. The victims of the communist totalitarian regime included tens of millions of Russians as well as other people and national minorities of the Soviet Union,” Klaus said. A widespread belief among the Czechs that Russians alone are to blame and that they should not be forgiven, is seen by Klaus as "a historical injustice" that gets in the way of the two countries' relations. “Our statehood was crushed by expansionist communism,” he said, adding that this tragedy of the Czechoslovakian people showed that the freedom of the people and nation cannot be held down forever.

"Only Belgrade reacted to Soviet invasion"

“It is interesting after the Balkan tragedies of the 1990s, to remember that the only country that reacted to the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia with a mobilization of its armed forces was Yugoslavia,” Klaus said.

He said that while the West "reacted with nothing but words", in reality, "it sound almost like it was coming from Brezhnev – that is your business, nothing will change with the division of the world based into spheres of influence, agreed upon in Yalta,” the Czech president told the gathering in Prague.

Klaus said at the beginning of his speech that the Czechs should not blame the Russians for that tragic August 21, 1968, when 200,000 Soviet, Hungarian, Polish, Bulgarian and East German tanks suffocated the reform attempts of the Prague Spring.

“The invasion was led by the Soviet totalitarian government that took the most responsibility for it. The victims of the communist totalitarian regime included tens of millions of Russians as well as other people and national minorities of the Soviet Union,” Klaus said.

A widespread belief among the Czechs that Russians alone are to blame and that they should not be forgiven, is seen by Klaus as "a historical injustice" that gets in the way of the two countries' relations.

“Our statehood was crushed by expansionist communism,” he said, adding that this tragedy of the Czechoslovakian people showed that the freedom of the people and nation cannot be held down forever.

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