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Around 90,000 people attended a four-day Festival of Freedom in Plzeň marking the liberation of the city by US troops at the end of World War II, organisers said on Monday. The event reached a climax on Sunday when a convoy hundreds of vintage military vehicles paraded through the West Bohemian city. General George Patton’s Third US Army liberated Plzeň on May 5, 1945. Red Army troops reached Prague several days later.

Events have been held in the Czech Republic marking the 72nd anniversary of the end of World War II in Europe. Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka, Defence Minister Martin Stropnický, Chief of the General Staff Josef Bečvář and other senior Czech Army figures attended the main event at Prague’s Vítkov National Memorial on Monday morning. In the afternoon President Miloš Zeman named new generals, including the country’s first woman general, Lenka Šmerdová. Ceremonies marking the anniversary of VE day were also held at Prague’s Klárov and in Brno, while several days of celebrations in Plzeň reached a climax.

On the occasion of the anniversary of the end of WW II, I speak with well-known historian Matěj Spurný about the Sudeten Germans whose future in post-war Czechoslovakia was sealed when many lined up with Nazi Germany ahead of the Munich Agreement. Most of the ethnic German population was forced to leave – spelling the end of what had been a largely peaceful coexistence going all the way back to the 13th century.

Czech Radio’s Prague headquarters was very much the focal point for the Prague uprising against Nazi rule at the end of WWII. And today’s top state personalities assembled on Friday outside the radio building to pay homage to the hundreds who fell at the barricades in Prague and in scattered skirmishes across the country.

Czech leaders marked the 72nd anniversary of the Prague Uprising at the Czech Radio building on Friday, a focal point of the uprising in which Czechs took up arms against the Nazis. The radio station itself became a beacon for resistance when the call went out in a broadcast for the rising to start and for citizens to come and help defend the radio building against German attempts to retake it. Among those attending Friday’s memorial event were the heads of both Czech house of parliament, Milan Štěch and Jan Hamáček, Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka, and Prague Mayor Adriana Krnáčová.

A convoy of historical U.S. military vehicles set off on its traditional ride through Prague on Friday at the start of celebrations marking the country’s liberation from Nazi rule. The convoy stopped at the US Embassy and in the coming days will ride through South Bohemian towns and villages which were liberated by the 3rd U.S. army under General George Patton´s command. It will culminate with a ceremonial parade through Plzen next weekend, the highlight of the town’s Freedom Celebrations.

One of the country’s last surviving WWII veterans, Colonel Bedřich Opočenský, has died at the age of 92. The news was confirmed by Defense Minister Martin Stropnický. Colonel Opočenský fought on the Eastern Front in World War II, taking part in the Battle of Dukla Pass and the liberation of Ostrava. According to Defense Minister Stropnický, just two weeks ago the government approved a proposal for him to be raised to the rank of general on the occasion of Veterans Day, November 11.

In the last programme in our series marking Radio Prague’s 80th birthday we heard recordings of Czechs and Slovaks fighting in the British armed forces during World War Two. This week our tour of the radio archives brings us forward to the heady days immediately after the war. It is May 1945, Czechoslovakia has been liberated, and Czechs and Slovaks who fought in the Allied armed forces are returning home. One recording evokes this moment vividly. It is a dramatized reading of a letter, written by a Czech soldier to an English girl at some point

Fifty-eight people, ten in memoriam, were awarded the highest honors bestowed by the Ministry of Defence at a special ceremony on Monday at the National Memorial at Vítkov Hill in the Czech capital. The event marked the end of WW II 71 years ago. During the ceremony, Defence Minister Martin Stropnický also promoted a number of war veterans to higher military rank and awarded commemorative medals to participants of the Prague Uprising in May 1945.

President Miloš Zeman attended celebrations at the Russian Embassy in Prague on Monday, marking the anniversary of the end of WWII, celebrated as Victory day in the Russian Federation and a number of post-soviet countries. Both the Czech president and Russia’s ambassador to Prague spoke at the event, with the latter outlining how states with different ideologies and political systems had overcome their differences to defeat their common adversary. Other notable guests on Monday included former Czech president Václav Klaus, ex-prime minister Petr Nečas, the speakers of both houses of Parliament and the American ambassador to Prague, Andrew Shapiro.