Tragic death of Milan Rastislav Štefánik commemorated on Bradlo hill

The 105th anniversary of the tragic death of General Milan Rastislav Štefánik was commemorated with the flyover of helicopters, the Slovak anthem, the laying of wreaths and several speeches delivered on the Bradlo hill above the town of Brezova pod Bradlom (Trencin region) on Saturday.

Several hundreds of people, including Premier Robert Fico (Smer-SD) and president-elect Peter Pellegrini (Hlas-SD) took part in the commemorative event held at Štefánik's monument.
General Milan Rastislav Štefánik was a distinguished Slovak politician, diplomat, aviator and astronomer, who was instrumental to the process of forming the first Czechoslovakia in 1918 and also served as its first minister of war.

Štefánik died on May 4, 1919 in a tragic plane crash while landing near Bratislava. He was buried together with the Italian aviators at the monument on the Bradlo hill, which was granted the status of national cultural monument in 1968.

TASR