BRATISLAVA, August 21, (WEBNOVINY) – While paying tribute to victims of August 21 at the memorial plaques in Bratislava, dedicated to the events of August 1968, Slovak President Ivan Gasparovic announced that our freedom took many lives and the fight to preserve it remains topical. “Forgive and do not forget! It is already history but a history that taught us much and that encourages us to esteem what the days after 1989 brought about. We gained freedom but it was not so easy. Many people lost their lives during that time and we were left here to fight for what they fell,” the president stated.
The head of the state opines that the fight for freedom presently does not mean the use of arms but of tools provided by democracy. “Freedom, respect for freedom, equal treatment, respect for equal treatment and, of course, solidarity which is very necessary at present,” he observed.
In the night from August 20 to August 21, troops of five Warsaw Pact countries, Bulgaria, Hungary, German Democratic Republic, Poland, and the Soviet Union, stormed into Czechoslovakia. Only Romania refused to take part in this „act of international solidarity“. The invasion was followed by a policy of normalization. The totalitarian regime in Czechoslovakia collapsed after events from November 17, 1989.
SITA