Rector of Masaryk University put out over slight from president

The rector of Masaryk University in Brno, Mikulas Bek, has said he feels slighted by the fact that he is not on the guest list of a celebration at Prague Castle on Czechoslovak Independence Day. The rector of the country’s second largest university has expressed the view that he failed to get invited because he did not enable the president to lecture at Masaryk University so as to maintain political neutrality on academic ground during the election campaign. Prague Castle has not commented on the development. On the occasion of the country’s public holiday the president traditionally bestows state decorations to distinguished personalities, a ceremony attended by politicians, cultural figures, academics and church dignitaries.