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Late president Václav Havel would have been “caught off guard” if he could have known that Prague’s international airport would be renamed in his honour, former close aide Ladislav Špaček has said. Mr Špaček told the Czech news agency on Friday, following the official renaming, that the former president, who died last December, had no longer thought he was important for Czech society, and would have been surprised by the expression of loss and respect his passing aroused. The renaming of the airport in Ruzyně to Václav Havel Airport Prague (Letiště Václava Havla Praha in Czech) took place at noon on Friday - the 76th anniversary of the Mr Havel’s birthday; numerous politicians, celebrities and members of the public attended. The current president, Václav Klaus, and the prime minister were notably absent.

The absence of President Václav Klaus from Friday’s airport ceremony was remarked upon and even criticised by a number of the VIP guests in attendance. Defence Minister Alexandr Vondra and Prague Mayor Bohuslav Svoboda both said they would have expected the president to attend. The author of the plan to rename the airport, producer Fero Fenič, said he was disappointed by the president’s absence, as he had hoped Mr Klaus would be consistent in the admiration he had shown for his predecessor at Mr Havel’s funeral last December. Mr Klaus did not give a reason for not attending and his schedule for the day was unknown. Presidents Klaus and Havel were generally considered to be heated political rivals and distant from one another personally and professionally.

The Czech Republic’s main international airport has been officially renamed after the late president Václav Havel. A special ceremony for the unveiling of Václav Havel Airport Prague (Letiště Václava Havla Praha in Czech) took place at noon on Friday - the 76th anniversary of the former-president’s birthday - in the presence of numerous politicians, celebrities and members of the public. An exhibition of news agency photographs of Mr Havel was also opened, with a parallel exhibit to be made in London. The idea to rename the airport after the last Czechoslovak and first Czech president’s was launched in the days following his death last December, and was petitioned by tens of thousands of people. Outside the Czech Republic, a library in Paris, a building of the European Parliament and several streets in Poland have been renamed in honour of the statesman and champion of human rights and liberty.

The Havel family’s VIZE 97 foundation has given its annual prize to the late Czech sociologist and university lecturer Miloslav Petrusek. The award is presented each year on October 5, the day of the late president’s birthday. Professor Petrusek, a former dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences of Charles University in Prague, did not live to receive the Havel foundation´s award himself, as he died on August 19, aged 75. His grandson Jan Holub will accept the award from Dagmar Havlová. A former advisor to the president, Petrusek was the author or co-author of a number of sociological studies, textbooks and articles and held the post of vice-rector of Charles University.

Planes bound for Prague will no longer be landing at Ruzyně Airport; at midday Friday the airport was officially renamed Letiště Václava Havla Praha, or Václav Havel Airport Prague at a lavish ceremony in Terminal 2. Some 80,000 people signed a petition organised by the film producer Fero Fenič to rename the airport to honour the late former president, who died in December.

Prague’s Ruzyně Airport will be officially renamed to Václav Havel Airport Prague on Friday, on the anniversary of the late ex-president’s birthday. A special ceremony at the airport will also see the unveiling of an exhibition of Václav Havel photographs taken by CTK news agency photographers. A parallel photo exhibition is to open in London. The Czech Centre in New York will mark the occasion with a newly published English language collection of Vaclav Havel’s plays. Václav Havel died last December at the age of 75.

A DVD featuring the highlights of a concert held in honour of Václav Havel on the night of his funeral last December is being launched at Prague’s Akropolis music venue on Sunday night. Artists such as The Plastic People of the Universe, Suzanne Vega and Ivan Král performed in the original show, which took place at the Czech capital’s Lucerna complex (which was built by Mr. Havel’s grandfather) on December 23, following his state funeral at St. Vitus Cathedral. Members of The Plastic People are among the musicians set to take part in Sunday’s DVD launch.

A primary school in the town of Žďárec, that former Czechoslovak and Czech President Václav Havel had attended in childhood, may be renamed after the former dissident who passed away at the end of last year. The town council will discuss the change soon, and the mayor believes all the paperwork might be completed by the end of the school year. The Vysočina region so far has no public institutions or places that are named after Václav Havel.

The physical work of renaming the international airport in Prague after the late president Havel began on Monday. Large panels bearing the new name Václav Havel Airport Prague (Letiště Václava Havla Praha in Czech) were being mounted in the three main terminals and on the arrivals runway. The official name change and accompanying ceremony is planned for October 5, which would be Mr Havel’s 76 birthday. The idea to rename the airport after the last Czechoslovak and first Czech president’s was launched in the days following his death last December, and was petitioned by tens of thousands of people.

During Václav Havel’s first year as Czechoslovak president, Prague Castle saw a string of visitors from around the world. And they did not just include heads of state and other political dignitaries. On January 21 1990, one of the first foreign guests to be received by the new president was none other than the legendary American rock musician, Frank Zappa, who had been one of the inspirations for the Czech underground movement in the ‘70s and ‘80s, including Havel himself.