Milan Kundera 'was an informant to the Czech Secret Police'
He is one of the world’s most feted critics of communism, but the Czech-born novelist Milan Kundera is now facing a battle to save his reputation after he was accused of denouncing a Western spy to the secret police during his student days.
Documents unearthed by Czech academics purport to show that in 1950 Mr Kundera, the author of The Unbearable Lightness of Being, told the Communist authorities where they could find Miroslav Dvoracek, a dissident who had fled Czechoslovakia but secretly returned to the country after being recruited by US intelligence agents.
Mr Dvoracek was arrested and narrowly escaped the death sentence, instead serving 14 years imprisonment for desertion, espionage and treason, mainly spent carrying out hard labour in uranium mines.
The reclusive Mr Kundera, who has lived in self-imposed exile in France since 1975 after his novels were banned in Czechoslovakia, has vehemently denied informing on Mr Dvoracek, and supporters of the novelist have pointed out that Communist security agencies often forged files to discredit opponents of the regime.
Read entire article at Telegraph (UK)
Documents unearthed by Czech academics purport to show that in 1950 Mr Kundera, the author of The Unbearable Lightness of Being, told the Communist authorities where they could find Miroslav Dvoracek, a dissident who had fled Czechoslovakia but secretly returned to the country after being recruited by US intelligence agents.
Mr Dvoracek was arrested and narrowly escaped the death sentence, instead serving 14 years imprisonment for desertion, espionage and treason, mainly spent carrying out hard labour in uranium mines.
The reclusive Mr Kundera, who has lived in self-imposed exile in France since 1975 after his novels were banned in Czechoslovakia, has vehemently denied informing on Mr Dvoracek, and supporters of the novelist have pointed out that Communist security agencies often forged files to discredit opponents of the regime.