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The former Czech president Václav Havel has stated that he wonders if the Velvet Revolution was not “pointless.” The comments were made in an interview with the Czech daily Lidové Noviny and were specifically referencing the news that the Social Democrats are likely to enter into coalitions with the Communist Party in several local governments – the first time the latter party is going to govern since 1989. In the interview, Mr Havel noted “Sometimes I wonder if what we did back then wasn’t completely pointless.” But Jiří Dientsbier, a fellow former dissident rejected Mr Havel’s take on the Communist Party arguing that the pre-1989 communists were little more than an instrument of Soviet imperial politics.

The Czech president Václav Klaus is no stranger to controversy. A long-time opponent of EU integration, the president has signalled his opposition to many of the pillars that make up this organization – from the euro to the hotly debated Lisbon Treaty. On Monday, during a visit to Ireland, the rhetoric was upped a notch, with the president openly labelling himself as an “EU dissident.” But the comparison to the 1989 anti-communist dissident movement is likely to strike a chord with many.

Former president Václav Havel has begun a year-long series of public discussions about Czech society. The first debate in the Sunrise in the Czech Republic series took place at Brno’s Divadlo Husa na provázku theatre on Saturday. The discussions are intended as a forum for critical reflection on the state of the country as the November 2009 20th anniversary of the Velvet Revolution draws near. Mr Havel said he enjoyed the first debate with Brno university students, who he said had not been deformed by the communist system. The playwright and former dissident also said he did not understand opposition to a planned US radar base; America has selflessly helped the Czechs many times in the past, he said.

Divadlo Husa na provázku on Friday premiered a new show entitled Cirkus Havel, which features scenes from a number of Mr Havel’s plays, including his most recent, Leaving.

In Mailbox today: RP reception in the Rocky Mountains, the history of St Vitus Cathedral in Prague, the first president of the Czech Republic, Czech football. Listeners quoted: Cameron Archbold, Reginaldo Anunciacão, Salahuddin Dolar, Rassem Ben Brahim.

The Czech Republic is still abuzz with allegations that Czech-born writer Milan Kundera informed on a suspected spy in 1950, and on Monday an unlikely ally came to Mr Kundera’s defence: former president Václav Havel. The two men famously clashed over the role played by dissidents in communist Czechoslovakia – Mr Havel accused the émigré writer of being cynical - but Mr Havel has now defended Mr Kundera and criticised his detractors.

New details have come to light on how Czechoslovakia’s communist era secret police, the StB, spied on the regime’s opponents, including the future president Václav Havel. The details were published on Thursday in the daily Mladá Fronta Dnes, and come from StB records currently being digitalised by the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes.

The current cult of economic growth at all costs may harm civilization, the former Czech president Václav Havel said in an interview for Z1 TV, a Czech digital television channel, on Monday. Reflecting on the global financial crisis, Mr. Havel said the cult of consumerism, growth and permanent change could lead civilization into an abyss. The dissident-playwright-turned-president suggested that a certain degree of market regulation here and there could help prevent serious economic crises but it would not change people’s growing obsession with money. He said an existential revolution of some kind was needed to make people recover their wits and re-think their priorities.

The Bulgarian-born philosopher Julia Kristeva will receive the Vision 97 Foundation Prize in Prague on Sunday. The foundation, which was established by former Czech president Václav Havel and his wife Dagmar, presents its award every year to one person who has broadened mankind’s horizons. Ms Kristeva, also known for her work in linguistics and psychoanalysis, said accepting the prize was a way of expressing her respect for Mr Havel, who she said combined experience of language and experience of politics in one person. Previous recipients of the Vision 97 Foundation Prize include the writer Umberto Eco and the psychologists Stanislav Grof and Philip G. Zimbardo.

Former Czech president Václav Havel has received a German award for his part in the unification of Germany and Europe. Mr Havel was presented with the Point-Alpha Prize at the German Embassy in Prague on Tuesday. It is named after a Cold War era US military observation post on the border between East and West Germany. Mr Havel led the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia and became president of the country in 1990.

On Tuesday, Prague’s Germany Embassy also marked the 19th anniversary of the first wave of East Germans fleeing to the west through the embassy in 1989.

The former Czech president Václav Havel has just been awarded the German Point Alpha Prize for his contribution to German, and European, unification. Tuesday’s ceremony did not take place at the usual venue – the former border between East and West Germany – but at the German Embassy in Prague. The embassy itself has also been marking an important chapter in its own history.