President of Latvia visited Charles University












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            On August 31, 2010, the president of Latvia, Valdis Zatlers, officially visited the univer

            representatives and faculty members from programmes related to Latvia. He was welcomed by 
            Charles University, Mr. Václav Hampl, in the Patriot Hall of the Karolinum building.
                                                                                                      
            “I am honoured to welcome such a distinguished guest. I find the flourishing relationship 
            is also one of the reasons I am very happy that the exhibition on the history of Latvia an
            and Latvian minister of education, Ms. Tatjana Koke, then went on to discuss the importanc
                                                                                                      
            University of Latvia. Dean of the Faculty of Arts, Mr. Michal Stehlík, thanked the members
            President Zatlers responded that “historians do not work for the past, but for the future”
            of his visit, the president talked to the teachers in the programmes related to his countr
                                                                                                      
                                                                                                      
            To coincide with the visit, the “The Baltic Way That Shook the World” exhibition was opene
            at the Faculty of Arts. It shows collages of photographs of the unique event of August 23,

            than a million people connected the capitals of the three Baltic republics, Riga, Tallinn 
            holding hands and forming a human chain, aimed at drawing the global attention to the popu
            independence of Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania of the Soviet Union.

            Charles University maintains close ties with Latvia. Latvian language and literature is be
            Department of Slavic and Eastern European Studies of the Faculty of Arts. Since the bilate
            was signed in 1999, our university has been collaborating with Latvia’s largest university

            University of Latvia). Student exchange between the two institutions flourishes: Czech stu
            language and literature and those from the Institute of International Studies go to Riga, 
            of Czech studies in turn come to Prague. Faculty and research staff also take part.

            Translation: Jaroslav Švelch