Meeting marks fifth anniversary of foundation of Institute for Study of Totalitarian Regimes and Security Services Archive
Prague, 1 February – A cordial gathering on the occasion of the fifth anniversary of the establishment of the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes and the Security Services Archive took place at the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes on the morning of Friday 1 February, 2013. The meeting was attended by the chairman of the Senate of the Parliament of the Czech Republic, Mr. Milan Štěch, the chairman of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Prof. Jiří Drahoš, a number of ambassadors, representatives of partner institutions and many other guests.
Alongside words of greeting from the honourable guests, and a video message from the former secretary of state of the USA, Mrs. Madeleine Albright, the programme included a brief appraisal of both institutions’ five years of existence and a look to the future.
Video greeting from Madeleine Albright
“I’d like to say all the best for the fifth anniversary of the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes and to thank them many times for the work they do. I think that work is very important, because they really teach about what happened in the Czechoslovak Republic under the totalitarian regime. They really look at the entire history; it is not just that they can help regarding what happened in Czechoslovakia, but in other countries too they can understand what can happen under such regimes. I’d also like to thank them a lot for the work that they did for me when I wrote a book about my family. They gave me all kinds of documents about my father. And I thank them very much for all their work and wish them well now on their fifth birthday. Thanks very much. I really think that the work that you do is very important, not just for Czechs and Slovaks but for people who had to experience such genuinely difficult moments and history under totalitarian regimes.”