The courage of the students who risked their lives to express their opposition to the totalitarian communist regime before the official start of the "Velvet Revolution" on November 17th, 1989, is being remembered on Thursday at the College of Liberal Arts of Comenius University in Bratislava. A book containing archive documents from faculty meetings, news articles and the memoirs of participants in the event that led to the fall of communist regime, will also be presented.
Writers, historians, economists, sociologists, former politicians and even psychiatrists from around the world will be gathering in Bratislava from Friday to Sunday to discuss "How does a good person turn evil?". It is part of the Central European Forum, an event that for the past eight years has marked the anniversary of the day when in 1989 Czechs and Slovaks took to the streets shouting "Freedom".
Politicians are also marking the event. President Andrej Kiska will meet with German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier who is visiting Slovakia on Friday and will be commemorating the victims of the communist regime. Prime Minister Robert Fico will spend the day at the European Union Social Summit in Sweden, where European leaders should talk about social rights and working conditions in the Union. The opposition parties will gather on Friday, November 17, on the SNP Square in Bratislava to talk about the fight for freedom and democracy.
