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A bust of the late Václav Havel has been unveiled at the US Congress in Washington. Wednesday’s ceremony was the culmination of a series of events held under the banner Celebration of Freedom marking the 25th anniversary of Czechoslovakia’s Velvet Revolution, in which Mr. Havel led the country to democracy after over four decades of communist rule. The dissident turned president is only the fourth European to be honoured in this way. Among those who spoke at the unveiling ceremony were John Boehner, the speaker of the House of Representatives, and Bohuslav Sobotka, the Czech prime minister.

Czech Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka’s ongoing visit to the United States has been marked by efforts to boost his country’s standing with the US administration. The country’s reputation in Washington has suffered after several senior Czech officials signalled the abandonment of a human-rights driven foreign policy shaped during the presidency of Václav Havel.

Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka, who is on a four-day visit to the United States, is set to meet with vice president Joe Biden in the White House on Tuesday. Mr Sobotka along with his delegation, including former Czech foreign minister Karel Schwarzenberg and former First Lady Dagmar Havlová, on Monday attended a concert of the Czech Philharmonic at the National Cathedral in Washington to mark the 25th anniversary of the Velvet Revolution. The Czech Prime Minister is also set to unveil a bust of Václav Havel in the Capitol Building, where Mr. Havel addressed a joint session of Congress in February 1990.

Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka, on an official four-day visit to the US, has reacted to protests against Czech head-of-state Miloš Zeman on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the Velvet Revolution which toppled the communist regime in Czechoslovakia. In a text message to the Czech News Agency, the prime minister noted that while the throwing of eggs at the president was “unacceptable aggression”, Mr Zeman likewise, in his view, shouldn’t have used expletives in a recent radio broadcast, nor relativized the brutality of a crackdown by communist riot police against students on November 17th, 1989.

The prime minister has come out critically against Mr Zeman before, saying the president had cast the Czech Republic in a bad light through the use of vulgar expressions. The foreign press noted on Monday that many Czechs were opposed to a strong pro-Russian stance by the president or his behaviour on a recent trip to China. One German daily suggested that some Czechs longed for a “new” Václav Havel – in other words, a strong moral authority. The late Mr Havel was brought to power in the Velvet Revolution and oversaw the country’s return to democracy after more than 40 years of totalitarian rule.

Gary Keith Griffin is currently in Prague presenting his new Czech-language movie Listopad (November), which explores the Velvet Revolution from the perspective of young participants in the street demonstrations of that time. Griffin also had personal experience to draw on, having himself been in the city as those historic events were unfolding at the end of 1989. When we met on Národní St., where the revolution began on November 17 that year, I asked the Oscar-winning cameraman what he had found when he arrived in Prague on an NBC news

Michael Žantovský is the author of a newly published book on the former Czech president simply entitled [:i:]Havel[:/i:] available in both Czech and English. He is one of a few members of the former Civic Forum movement still active in public life, currently serving as the Czech Ambassador to the United Kingdom. Back in 1990, he became a press spokesperson for the new president Václav Havel. From 1992-97, he served as ambassador to the United States. He has also served as Czech Ambassador to Israel, been elected to the Czech Senate, and worked as

A relay reading of Michael Žantovksý’s new biography of Václav Havel gets underway on Friday afternoon at the Lucerna Passage in central Prague. The reading from Havel is part of a Festival of Freedom, which has been put together to mark the 25th anniversary of the start of the Velvet Revolution. Most of those taking part are friends of the late Mr. Havel, who spearheaded the political changes at the end of 1989 and was president for 13 years. Mr. Žantovksý, who is now Czech ambassador to the UK, was his spokesman and advisor.

Ex-president Václav Havel has been honoured with a memorial bench in Oxford. The bench, located on the university campus, is designed to invite discussion and like others located in Georgetown, Dublin, Barcelona or Prague, it was designed by Mr. Havel’s close friend architect Bořek Šípek. The bench in Oxford's University Parks is the first and only one in the UK. Its unveiling was scheduled to coincide with the November events marking the 25th anniversary of the Velvet Revolution that toppled communism.

A new biography of Václav Havel, written by his former press secretary, advisor and long-time friend Michael Žantovský, will be officially released on Thursday in Britain and the U.S. The biography, entitled Havel: A Life, maps Mr Havel’s journey from dissident playwright to president. Mr Žantovský, who is currently the Czech ambassador to London, wrote the book in English. Its Czech version is already selling in bookstores around the country.

President Miloš Zeman says a predecessor, Vaclav Havel, was a 'Utopian' who believed in a brave new world but lacked the 'motor' to bring it about. Speaking on Czech Radio on Sunday as part of the Interviews from Lány series, Mr. Zeman said Mr. Havel had failed to react to large-scale asset stripping in the privatisation era until 1997. However, he rejected a statement by another former president, Vaclav Klaus, who compared the leader of the Velvet Revolution to a 'reform communist' in an interview published on Saturday.

Mr. Zeman - who employed several swear words in the interview - also said that a review of a civil service bill he has petitioned for at the Constitutional Court will concern more than the fact that it formally allows for politically appointed deputy ministers. A presidential veto of the law was earlier overturned by the Chamber of Deputies. He said the president’s offices lawyers had found several other shortcomings in the legislation. The government says the bill will depoliticise the civil service.