Czech MPs reject an Austrian call for dialogue over Benes decrees

Czech MPs rejected on Wednesday an invitation by Austrian politicians addressed to the Czech and Slovak parliaments for dialogue over the post-war decrees issued by Czechoslovak President Edvard Benes. According to the leaders of Austrian political parties, with the exception of Austrian Greens, the expulsion and expropriation of Sudeten Germans after the Second World War was wrong. Miroslav Vlcek, the chairman of the Chamber of Deputies, said that Czech politicians consider of the Benes decrees a closed issue.

The presidential decrees were the legal bases for the expulsion of about three million ethnic Germans from Czechoslovakia after the Second World War.