Czech Senate approves institution to examine totalitarian past

The Czech Senate has approved the founding of the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes, aimed at allowing the country to understand and come to terms with the Nazi occupation and Czechoslovakia's 41-year-long Communist regime. Senators voted in favour of the institution, whose counterparts have already existed for several years in neighbouring Slovakia and Poland. The bill must now be approved by President Vaclav Klaus. Lower house lawmakers approved the project at the beginning of May. The main task of the new institute will be to group together, analyse and make accessible documents from the Nazi occupation from 1938-1945 and the Communist regime from 1948-1989. The archives will include the documents of the former Communist secret police, the StB.