Czechs celebrating Czechoslovak Independence Day

Czechs are celebrating the 101st anniversary of the founding of an independent state of Czechs and Slovaks on October 28, 1918.

The anniversary is being commemorated with a wreath-laying ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Prague’s Vítkov Memorial, at the grave of the country’s co-founder and Czechoslovakia’s first president Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk at Lány near Prague and at Prague Castle where President Zeman is to hand out high state awards to leading personalities on Monday evening.

Among this year’s laureates are former president Václav Klaus, the last surviving Czech RAF pilot Emil Boček, ice hockey legend Jaromír Jágr, Škoda Favorit designer Petr Hrdlička, Srbian film director Emir Kusturica, the head of the Supreme Audit Office Miloslav Kala or, in memoriam, Corporal Tomáš Procházka, who died last year while serving with the Czech military contingent in Afghanistan.

The anniversary is being marked arround the country at landmarks linked to the founding of Czechoslovakia.