Top officials attend ceremony on site of Nazi massacre

The Czech Republic's top officials attended a memorial ceremony on Saturday on the site of Lidice, the Central Bohemian village that the Nazis razed to the ground 62 years ago in retaliation for the assassination of the Reichsprotektor Reinhard Heydrich. Speaking at the ceremony, President Vaclav Klaus said that Europe had a new chance to overcome the wounds of the past. Both President Klaus and Prime Minister Vladimir Spidla criticised attempts at revising history and playing down the Lidice atrocity. On June 10th 1942, 173 men were shot and the women and children were transported to concentration camps. Of the children only seventeen survived.