Czechs mourn Velvet Revolution icon Havel

A guard of honor stands next to a portrait of former Czech President Vaclav Havel at the Prague Castle in Prague, Czech Republic, Sunday, Dec. 18, 2011. Havel, the dissident playwright who wove theater into politics to peacefully bring down communism in Czechoslovakia and become a hero of the epic struggle that ended the Cold War, died Sunday in Prague. He was 75. AP PHOTO/PETR DAVID JOSEK

PRAGUE—Hundreds of mourners bowed their heads Monday as they filed past the coffin of former Czech president and Velvet Revolution icon Vaclav Havel.

About 1,000 people, many holding flowers, queued outside a church in central Prague to pay homage to the man who toppled communism and changed his country forever after his coffin was put out for public viewing.

Havel died on Sunday aged 75 after a long illness. A state funeral is likely to be held on Friday, according to the CTK news agency.

The crowd filled up the narrow cobble-stoned street leading to the historic Saint Wenceslas church, where Havel’s foundation has set up a non-denominational spiritual center.

“I admired the man incredibly for his courage, his noble character, his ideas, for the sacrifice he made for us all,” said a visibly moved Jan Zelenka, the editor of several of Havel’s books, queuing with a pink rose.

A dissident playwright whose work focused heavily on the inhumanity of the Soviet-backed totalitarian regime ruling the former Czechoslovakia, Havel’s best-known saying is “Truth and love must prevail over lies and hatred.”

President of the newly free Czechoslovakia from 1989 to 1992 and of its successor the Czech Republic from 1993 to 2003, Havel died after a long battle with respiratory illness, a legacy of the almost five years he spent in communist jails.

Havel succumbed to “circulatory failure” caused by health problems starting with pneumonia he had suffered from in prison in 1983, his doctor Tomas Bouzek told Czech public television.

Mourner Hana Joova, a violinist who played at Havel’s 70th birthday party, clutched a bouquet of red and white flowers adorned with a heart.

“We’re terribly sorry. It’s such a loss,” she told AFP outside the church.

Havel’s coffin will be in the church for public viewing until Wednesday when it will be moved to Prague Castle for two days.

“I expect huge interest. We’ve got a message from (US Secretary of State) Hillary Clinton, she expects to arrive on Friday if the date is confirmed,” Havel’s secretary Sabina Tancevova told Czech Television.

The center-right Czech cabinet was due to meet later Monday to plan the national mourning.

Hundreds of mourners also came to Prague Castle, the seat of Czech presidents, to sign condolence books for the dissident playwright who turned president after steering the peaceful 1989 Velvet Revolution that toppled communism.

“Mr. President meant a lot to me as a statesman, and a man too. I liked him in all respects, he was an honest man. I feel very sad,” a weeping Marta Cabanova, a Prague pensioner, told AFP.

Martina Binarova, a 32-year-old civil servant, said he was a “great role model.”

“I was 10 when the 1989 revolution took place, and I was very excited even as a child. I knew what the regime was like thanks to my parents, who could not study under the communist regime,” she said.

“He was the best president, we’ll never have another one like him,” said 10-year-old Ondrej Pavelka.

Impromptu vigils were held and church bells rang out in unison across the country as news of Havel’s death started to spread on Sunday afternoon.

Havel died at his weekend home in the village of Hradecek, about 140 kilometers (90 miles) northeast of Prague, to which he retreated to convalesce in the summer.

Outside the house, a mourner set up a special memorial of with candles and two beer bottles from a local brewery where Havel, a dissident playwright during communism, worked in 1974 after communist authorities banned him from theatres.