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Last week marked the 59th anniversary of the final days that led-up to the end of the Second World War. In Bohemia those fateful days were defined by the Prague Uprising, which saw some 30, 000 take up arms in the Czech capital against their German occupiers. Though the Nazi grip on Bohemia and Moravia began to weaken, the threat of newer Nazi atrocities grew with every passing hour.

Elsewhere in the Czech capital, around 200 people attended a ceremony at the Olsansky cemetery in memory of Soviet soldiers who died during World War II. Until 1991, May 9 was celebrated in Czechoslovakia - as in Russia - as the end of World War II in Europe. Now it is marked in the Czech Republic a day earlier, on May 8.

A ceremony has been held on Prague's Vitkov hill to mark the 59th anniversary of the end of World War II in Europe. President Vaclav Klaus laid a wreath at the grave of the Unknown Soldier during the ceremony, which was also attended by other senior politicians and World War II veterans. Among the latter was Oldrich Prazak, who took part in the Prague Uprising between May 5 and 9, 1945: he said his generation had fought for the existence of the Czech nation and the survival of its identity.

Czechs around the country including World War II veterans, public officials, and the prime minister himself, have marked the 59th anniversary of the Prague Uprising. 59 years ago this day an estimated 30, 000 Czechs took up arms in organised resistance against their German occupiers; five days of battles left thousands dead. In a commemorative ceremony on Wednesday Prime Minister Vladimir Spidla laid a wreath outside the Czech Radio building in Prague, where dozens died during some of fiercest fighting in May 1945. Mr Spidla reminded those at the ceremony that the uprising had countered plans by the Nazis to destroy Prague, words echoed by Andela Dvorakova, of the Czech Freedom Fighters Union.

May 5th is the 59th anniversary of the Prague Uprising that saw Czechs engage their German occupiers in deadly battle, in an attempt to take back their city during the final days of the Second World War. At 12:33 on May 5th Prague radio called on all Czechs to take up arms in the organised resistance: it was the beginning of five days of fierce fighting that would see thousands lose their lives.

We don't usually use archive recordings for Witness, but today we'll make an exception. This year is the 65th anniversary of the tragic day in March 1939, when German troops marched into Prague, beginning six years of Nazi occupation. At the time, Franta Kocourek was one of Czechoslovak Radio's star reporters. Four days after Bohemia and Moravia had been declared a "Protectorate of the German Reich", he reported live on the huge military parade that the Germans had organized on Prague's Wenceslas Square. He made no attempt to conceal his sense

A new book has gone on sale in both a Czech and an English version, that tells the deeply moving story of the little village of Lidice, just outside Prague. Over the years a great deal has been written about the village, which the Nazis singled out in June 1942 to wipe off the map in revenge for the assassination of the man they had put in charge of occupied Bohemia and Moravia, Reinhard Heydrich. But this new book is unusual.

It has emerged this week that a Czech man who is to receive the Order of the British Empire from Queen Elizabeth II on Friday has been lying about his war record for almost 60 years. Jan Horal, who is 81, has claimed since the end of World War II that he flew in Britain's RAF, and for the Canadian Air Force in Africa. It turns out, however, that he actually served in the Czechoslovak Brigade tank division. Despite Mr Horal's lies many people have been quick to defend him, pointing to the great work he has done to help veterans over the years. Petr

Pavel Theiner was eleven when his family left Prague in 1968. From his London exile Pavel's father became one of the most prominent figures in the Czech émigré literary community, and Pavel grew up unable to return to the country where he had spent his childhood. But today he is back in his native Prague with his wife and four-year-old daughter, working as a media researcher. Here he remembers his grandfather, a man who has remained important in Pavel's life, even though he died when Pavel was still small.

Juraj Szanto is a medical journalist, and has had a long career in Prague as a dentist. He originally comes from the part of southern Slovakia that was annexed by Hungary just before the Second World War. When the war broke out, his father was sent to the Russian Front and his mother was imprisoned in Budapest for her links with the resistance. Juraj was fifteen when his mother was released in 1944, but this was just the time when the Nazis began to transport Hungarian Jews to the death camps in the east. Juraj and his mother were among thousands