This month is the 14th anniversary of the dramatic events that in a matter
of days brought down Czechoslovakia's communist regime. We remember the
period as a bloodless or "velvet" revolution, but on the 17th
November 1989, at the height of the student demonstration that sparked the
revolution, a rumour spread like wildfire that a mathematics student from
Prague's Charles University, a certain Martin Smid, had been beaten to
death by the police. It was true that Martin had been at the
demonstration, but as we hear from him now, rumours of his death