Prague, March 18 (TASR) – Slovak President Zuzana Caputova paid an informal visit to Prague on Monday – she laid a wreath in honour of the victims of the December shooting at the Faculty of Arts of Charles University, in which 14 people and the shooter were killed.
Speaking to the media at the Jan Palach memorial, she said she understood the Czech government’s decision to scrap a planned joint meeting with the Slovak government due to their differing attitudes towards the conflict in Ukraine.
“There are important, even value-based differences when it comes to foreign policy. This is what [Czech] Prime Minister [Petr] Fiala communicated. I must say that I understand his reasoning. I find some of the statements made by Slovak government representatives unfortunate,” iDNES.cz news website quoted Caputova as saying.
The Slovak head of state later called on Facebook for respect instead of hatred in connection with the tragic shooting at Charles University. “As it is common among close people, we experienced this pain together with the Czechs, just as we experience their joys with them. I wish very much, for both our nations, that we can succeed in replacing hatred with respect. For hatred is always followed by tragedy,” she wrote on the social network.
The Slovak president came to Prague at the invitation of the Vaclav Havel Library. In the Czech capital on Monday, she is also scheduled to meet with Czech Prime Minister Fiala and President Petr Pavel, with whom she’ll attend the premiere of a film called ‘This is Havel, can you hear me?’ about the former Czech president and one of the main figures of the 1989 Velvet Revolution.