Prague, Dec 6 (CTK) – The Czech Jaromir Savrda Prize for testimony on totalitarianism goes to the Alicija and Zbigniew Gluza couple of Polish historians and former dissidents this year, Petra Vondrova told CTK on behalf of the organising PANT NGO yesterday.
The prize is designated for personalities actively spreading the truth about the communist period.
It will be presented to the Gluza couple in Prague on the December 10 Human Rights Day, Vondrova said.
Alicija Gluza, 60 and Zbigniew Gluza, 61, worked in the Solidarity trade union movement from the early 1980s.
In January 1982, they launched Karta, an underground magazine.
At present, they are protagonists of the Warsaw-based Centrum Karta NGO, which has been legally operating since 1990.
The centrum includes a large Eastern Archive that documents the repressions Polish citizens faced after the Soviet occupation in September 1939.
The Centrum issues a quarterly focusing on contemporary historical events.
The prize bears the name of Czech writer and former dissident Jaromir Savrda, a signatory of the Charter 77 pro-democracy appeal.
A native and resident of north Moravia, Savrda was expelled from the Faculty of Law of Charles University in 1972 due to his civic stances. The communist regime sentenced him to 2.5 years in prison in 1979 and to 25 months in 1983.
He died in 1988 at the age of 55 of the consequences of imprisonment and persecution by the totalitarian regime.
The previous Jaromir Savrda Prize winners include the late leading dissident and first Czechoslovak post-communist president, Vaclav Havel (1936-2011).
rtj/dr/ms
