Thousands of people watch Havel´s state funeral on large screens

Prague - The public were not let in the St Vitus´s Cathedral at Prague Castle where the state funeral of former president Vaclav Havel took place today, but thousands of citizens and visitors to the city watched the ceremony on large screens in the 1st and 2nd courtyards and outside Prague Castle.

Havel, former dissident and a playwright, was last Czechoslovak president (1989-1992) and first Czech president (1993-2003).

He died on December 18 aged 75.

People who arrived in Prague from across the country as well foreign tourists joined the one-minute silence at noon in the streets as well as in offices. Means of public transport went to a halt in some towns.

The medieval astronomical clock in Prague´s Old Town Square, one of the city´s landmarks, also stopped for five minutes at noon.

The apostles that normally pass behind small open windows at every hour remained standing in the open windows.

The visitors included Josef Janicek and Eva Turnova, from the Plastic People of the Universe, of which Havel was a non-playing member and collaborator.

They wore funeral tricolors like Japanese tourists, for instance.

Some people came to Prague Castle to express their opinions. One elderly man wore a badge of the Civic Forum, the main grouping of people of various opinions that was initiated by Havel and that played the decisive role in the fall of the communist regime in late 1989.

Another man carried a picture of current President Vaclav Klaus with an inscription reading "He does not speak for me."

People, with the young predominating, spent the two-hour service in silence. Many of them braved the cold weather with thermos bottles with hot drinks.

The ceremony was ended with the national anthem. Twenty-one salvos were fired from the nearby Petrin hill and bells were ringing.

Author: CTK
www.ctk.cz

Capturetr
yakamoz01 friend