President Klaus lays flowers at controversial Benes bust

President Vaclav Klaus laid flowers at the busts of Czechoslovak presidents T.G. Masaryk and Edvard Benes in the courtyard of a hotel in the southern town of Cesky Krumlov. The bust of president Edvard Benes has been at the centre of criticism from the part of some Sudeten German groups and politicians from Upper Austria. Benes, who was president before and after the Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia during World War II, issued a set of decrees that led to the post-war expulsion of some 2.5 million ethnic Germans. Mr Klaus is spending two nights at the hotel at the invitation of its owner.