Prague, Sept 24 (CTK) – The stories of the victims of the totalitarian regime in former Czechoslovakia, which have been available in an audio archive, will be published on Monday under the title The Stories of Heroes of the 20th Century – the Memory of the Nation.
The book has been put together by a team of authors from around the Post Bellum society. The stories can be read by children aged 13 and more.
The more than 30 stories were recorded by people from the NGO Post Bellum who have been collecting the memoirs of survivors for 15 years.
About 350,000 Czechs and Slovaks died during World War Two. About 100,000 joined the domestic resistance, 32,000 fought on the eastern front and 12,000 on the western, Mikulas Kroupa, director of Post Bellum writes in the preview to the book.
There were 335 prisons in Czechoslovakia during the period of the communist rule (1948-89) and 107 labour camps where about 300,000 political prisoners suffered. A total of 248, incluidng 247 men, were executed.
Most of the heroes of the war and post-war period have been forgotten or are not known at all, Kroupa said and added that their legacy rests in that they inspire contemporary people.
Post Bellum has sought and recorded the stories of eye-witnesses of milestone moments of the past century. Together with public Czech Radio and the Totalitarian Regimes Study Institute, it has built a publicly accessible collection of memoirs with 3000 recordings.
The NGO annually awards people who have proved by their life that honour, freedom and human dignity are no empty words.
ms/dr
