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Country Profile : CZECH REPUBLIC
About the Czech Republic A beautiful country of mountains, rivers, spas and romantic castles, the Czech Republic is widely visited for its architecture which includes Baroque, Art Nouveau and Cubist buildings recognised as some of the finest in Europe. The capital Prague is lively and sophisticated, whilst Moravia retains an old fashioned, rural charm. Famous too for its art, literature and music, the Czech cultural scene is once again pulsing to the sounds of jazz and punk, whilst writers such as Milan Kundera, Ivan Klima and Josef Skorecky receive a wide international audience. The Czechs also excel in art forms such as puppetry and their former president following independence was the well-known dissident playwright Vaclav Havel. With a long history, which has been written back to the 5th Century, the golden age of Bohemia (as it was known then) occurred under Hapsburg rule in 13th and 14th Centuries, with Prague known as one of Europe’s most important cities. Czech History Part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire until WW1, the Czechs and Slovaks merged to form Czechoslovakia, a federation of equal republics at the end of the war. A troubled time ensued with internal divisions between ethnic minorities, with Hitler eventually being given the German speaking Sudetenland during the fateful 1938 Munich Agreement. During the following Nazi occupation during WW2, the Czech intelligentsia were targeted with many killed, along with tens of thousands of Czech and Slovak Jews. A Czech uprising against the Nazi occupiers coincided with the arrival of the Red Army in May 1945. Czechoslovakia was once again an independent state. In 1945, under the Benes Decree, up to ½ million Sudeten Germans and Hungarians were forcibly expelled, whilst an unknown number, probably in the thousands were killed during this painful period. During the 1946 elections the Communist Party gained the most votes and Czechoslovakia fell within the Soviet sphere of influence. The 1950s were a period of severe economic difficulties and repression. Anti-Soviet demonstrations and attempts to create a liberalised form of Communism ‘socialism with a human face’ under leader Alexander Dubcek were crushed by Warsaw Pact troops in 1968 and led to a period of harsh repression for Czechoslovakians. Dubcek was exiled in 1969, whilst hundreds of thousands of party workers were expelled from the party and imprisoned or lost their jobs. The collapse of Soviet authority in 1989 led to the ‘Velvet Revolution’ spearheaded by the Czech dissident playwright Vaclav Havel, who formed an anti-communist coalition and presided over the newly-independent Czechoslovakia. Following on from the ‘Velvet Divorce’ when both component countries of the Czech Republic and Slovakia gained independence from each other, Vaclav Havel following a brief resignation, continued as President of the Czech Republic until 2003. Membership of NATO was granted in 1999. Issues surrounding the Benes Decree and discrimination towards the Roma population, numbering about 300,000 have not prevented the Czech Republic from gaining full EU membership in May 2004. Czech Economy One of the most stable and prosperous former communist states, growth has been supported by exports to the EU, primarily Germany, together with substantial foreign investment, a booming tourist industry and increased domestic demand. |
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