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The lower house of parliament has passed a bill under which the Czech Republic should pay compensation to victims of the Soviet occupation of Czechoslovakia between 1968 and 1991. The bill awards 150,000 crowns (6,631 dollars) to the families of dozens of people killed in the invasion, and smaller amounts to people injured or raped. Soviet troops and soldiers from four other communist countries invaded Czechoslovakia on August 21, 1968, to halt a liberalisation movement led by Czechoslovak Communist party chief Alexander Dubcek. After the invasion, the Soviet Union helped install a hard-line leadership which dismissed reformers from the party and jobs, and suppressed human rights and opposition movements. Soviet troops stayed in Czechoslovakia until 1991. The bill must still win the backing of the Senate.

Last weekend was the 36th anniversary of one of the most tragic events associated with the Soviet occupation of Czechoslovakia in 1968. On 16th January 1969, a twenty-year-old student Jan Palach doused himself with petrol and set himself alight on Prague's Wenceslas Square. It was a desperate protest against the invasion and growing public apathy in the face of the process known as "normalization", as the hardliners gradually regained control. Jan Palach died from his burns three days later, and around the world his sacrifice became one of the

In this edition of Czechs in History, we look at the life and career of Gustav Husak, a Slovak native who left an indelible mark on Czech history as the last communist president of Czechoslovakia. Gustav Husak was born in Bratislava in 1913. A gifted and talented student, he trained as a lawyer at Comenius University, where he also joined the Communist Party in 1933.

Czech historians are to be allowed access to much of the Russian archival material that was closed to them up to now. Likely to be of the greatest interest to Czech researchers is documentation connected to the Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, which brought an end to the country's attempt at reforms aimed at bringing "socialism with a human face".

Czech historians are to be allowed access to much of the Russian archival material that was closed to them up to now. Likely to be of the greatest interest to Czech researchers is documentation connected to the Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, which brought an end to the country's attempt at reforms aimed at bringing "socialism with a human face".

On August 21, 1968, Warsaw Pact tank rolled into Czechoslovakia. As Soviet troops shot at the radio building, Czechoslovak radio appealed for calm. The invasion had come on direct order from Moscow to put an end to the Prague Spring - the attempt by the Czechoslovak Communist Party, led by Alexander Dubcek, to introduce "Communism with a human face", to become more independent and loosen the tight grip of the Soviet Union. Protests in the streets of Prague and other towns and cities, left dozens of people dead and hundreds injured at the hands

Over a hundred people gathered in front of the Czech Radio building on Saturday to commemorate the anniversary of the Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968. Vinohradska Street, where Czech Radio is situated, was one of the places that saw the biggest clashes between occupying Warsaw Pact troops and Czech demonstrators, and therefore is a venue where eyewitnesses and public personalities recall these events every year on the 21st August - the day Czechoslovakia was occupied.

A remembrance ceremony has been held in front of the Czech Radio building on Prague's Vinohradska St, the site of the bloodiest fighting on August 21, 1968, when Soviet-led troops invaded Czechoslovakia to crush the reform movement known as the Prague Spring. More than 90 people were killed and several hundred wounded in the first weeks of the invasion.

Speaking at Saturday's ceremony - which was attended by around 100, mostly elderly people - the chairman of the Chamber of Deputies, Lubomir Zaoralek said efforts to create a more free life in Czechoslovakia did not die under the invading armies' tanks, but a year later in August 1969, when Czechoslovak security forces suppressed protest demonstrations.

The mayor of Prague, Pavel Bem, warned of the dangers of forgetting the past, pointing out that one in five Czechs now vote for the Communist Party. He thanked those who had shown opposition to the occupying troops in 1968, and those who survived the following two decades unbowed.

Today we look at the roles of some of those who believed in the Czech branch of socialism, announcers at Radio Prague during the 50s and 60s. We'll find out what inspired them to leave their homes in Canada and the U.S. to make a new start in Prague - to help build socialism in former Czechoslovakia - a very unusual fate.

The former hard-line Communist Party official Karel Hoffman on Monday began serving out a four-year prison term for his role in the 1968 Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia. Mr Hoffmann, head of telecommunications at that time, was found guilty of "sabotage" for having ordered the country's medium-wave transmitter to stop official radio broadcasts condemning the invasion.