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A new drama-documentary premiered in Prague on Thursday evening about the incredible story of Nicholas Winton. Called ‘Nicky’s Family’, the film retells the story of the British man who saved hundreds of Jewish children from Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia in 1939. Winton was later knighted for his efforts, and Sir Nicholas, now 101, was in Prague once again to attend the premiere.

Six post-communist EU members, including the Czech Republic have urged Brussels to push for an EU ban on denial of communist crimes. In a joint appeal sent to the EU’s justice commissioner, Viviane Reding, they argue that the principle of justice should assure the same approach to all totalitarian regimes. Holocaust denial is already banned in many EU states and the six nations petitioning the EU justice commissioner would like to see similar treatment applied to the crimes of communism.

For a decade now, Czech teenagers have been doing research into the fates of Jewish people who lived in their localities before, during and after World War II, as part of a project entitled “Neighbours Who Disappeared”. Organisers say participants at schools around the country have learned valuable lessons, and unearthed a lot of previously unknown information.

In related news, the District Court of West Prague has once again exonerated Czech-Canadian Vladimír Stwora, who put a Czech translation of an article denying the holocaust on his website. Mr Stwora was first charged with hate speech crimes last year and given a ten-month suspended sentence. However, a higher court overruled the decision on the grounds that he was not proven to have cast doubt on the holocaust. Mr Stwora says the aim of the text was to point out the various official holocaust death counts and start a discussion about it.

It is not often that school plays get to be performed at international theatre festivals, still less so when it involves taking performers, props and scenery hundreds of miles half way across a continent. But this is just what happened when a group of teenagers from Britain brought a brand new play to Prague’s Fringe Festival in 2008. And it was not by chance that this play was brought to Prague. In this week’s Czech Books, David Vaughan finds out more from the play’s author.

On Saturday, the citizens’ group Stolpersteine is to lay 32 new stones commemorating victims of the Holocaust throughout Prague. The stones, which measure ten by ten centimeters and are implemented into the pavement, display information about victims of the Nazi genocide who lived in Prague. As part of the project, such stones are placed in front of the victims’ last place of residence before their deportation. Since the European initiative was brought to the Czech Republic three years ago, eighty such stones were installed throughout the country.

In June 2009, during the Czech Republic’s EU presidency, 46 countries pledged to provide assistance to Holocaust survivors, to accelerate the restitution of property stolen during the Holocaust, and to set up a special institute to pursue these commitments. The special advisor to the US secretary of state for Holocaust-era assets, Stuart Eizenstat, is back in Prague this week checking on developments.

Prague is one of a few sites in Europe that has been chosen as an access point for Hollywood director Steven Spielberg’s collection of Holocaust recollections. The link with the Spielberg-financed Shoah Foundation has already created strong interest locally after only a few weeks.

A Czech Radio reporter and colleague from the Los Angeles Times in a joint interview have helped uncover evidence which could prove crucial in the current trial of John Demjanjuk, a man accused of involvement in Nazi death camp crimes. The evidence – the testimony of a witness – could help pin Demjanjuk down as a guard who participated in the murder of thousands of Jews at an infamous Polish camp.

The Holocaust represented pure evil that could be reawakened in the future, the Czech prime minister, Jan Fischer, said at a ceremony at the Czech Senate marking Holocaust Memorial Day on Wednesday. He said the Holocaust defied comprehension and belief, adding that such evil remained within mankind and could, unfortunately, be revived. Mr Fischer is himself of Jewish origin and has in recent years developed an interest in the religion. January 27 is the anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi’s Auschwitz death camp in 1945.