Prosecution of top Communists over border deaths halted

The state attorney has halted the prosecution of three top representatives of the Communist regime over the use of firearms on Czechoslovakia’s borders in the pre-1989 period. One-time Communist Party general secretary Miloš Jakeš died in July. The other officials concerned, former prime minister Lubomír Štrougal and ex-interior minister Vratislav Vajnar, are both now mentally incapacitated and incapable of understanding charges against them, the district state attorney for Prague 1, Jan Lelek, said on Wednesday.

The Office for the Documentation and Investigation of the Crimes of Communism said the three’s inactivity had led to nine people who tried to escape to the West being shot dead or torn apart by dogs between March 1976 and the end of 1989. At least seven others were injured.