The international conference “Russia’s hybrid war against the democratic world. A challenge for European remembrance policy” took place in Prague on 16-18 November 2022, followed by a meeting of the Council of Members of the Platform of European Memory and Conscience.

The event was co-organized jointly by the Office of the Czech Government of the Czech Republic, the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes and the Twentieth Century Memorial Museum, under the auspices of the Government of the Czech Republic during the Czech Presidency of the Council of the European Union.

• • About the conference

Venue: Liechtenstein Palace, U Sovových mlýnů 4, Praha 1

17.00 – registration

Opening and Gala Evening 

18:00 – 19:00

• Opening address by Miloš Vystrčil, Chairman of the Senate, Parliament of the Czech Republic
• Word of greetings by the organisers: Ladislav Kudrna, Director, Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes, Marek Mutor, President, Platform of European Memory and Conscience
• Remarks by Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, laureate of the Prize of the Platform of European Memory and Conscience for the year 2020
• Award of the Prize of the Platform of European Memory and Conscience for the year 2021

from 19:00 – Gala reception with music (Milan Svoboda Jazz Quartet)

• 8:30 – 9:15 registration
• 9:45 – Opening of the exhibition “Under the Alien Skies: Lithuanian People in Soviet Hard Labour Camps and Exile in 1940 – 1958” in front of the Liechtenstein Palace by H.E. Gitanas Nausėda, President of Lithuania and Petr Fiala, Prime Minister of the Czech Republic

Opening of the conference

• 10:00 – Opening speech by Petr Fiala, Prime Minister of the Czech Republic

• 10:10 – Inaugural address by H.E. Gitanas Nausėda, President of Lithuania

• 10:30 – Special guest: Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, National Leader of Belarus, Belarus and its European Future

Session I: Russian historical disinformation as a tool of aggression

10:45-13:00
Chair: Marek Mutor (PL), PEMC President

• prof. Nicolas J. Cull (USA) University of Southern California, Keynote speech: Countering Soviet Disinformation. Lessons from the past

• Rasa Juknevičienė (LT), MEP, head of the Informal Remembrance Group in the European Parliament, former Minister of Defence
• Volodymyr Viatrovych (UA), historian, MP, Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine
• Hon. Donald L. Ritter (USA), Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation and Museum
• Karol Polejowski (PL), Deputy President, Institute of National Remembrance

lunch

Session II: How to counter Russian disinformation?

14.00-16.00
Chair: Łukasz Kamiński (PL), Director, Ossolineum Institute

• Michal Koudelka (CZ), Director, Security Information Service of the Czech Republic
• Pavel Žáček (CZ), historian, MP, Chairman of the Committee on Security, Parliament of the Czech Republic
• Martyna Bildziukiewicz (EU), Head of East Stratcom Task Force, European External Affairs Service, EUvsDisinfo project (online)
• Veronika Krátká Špalková (CZ), analyst, Kremlin Watch
• Kenneth Lasoen (NL), research fellow, Clingendael Institute
• David Satter (USA), journalist and historian, author of The Less You Know, The Better You Sleep

16.00-16.30 coffee break

Session III: Communist experience in the European remembrance perspective

16.30 – 17.45
Chair: prof. Antoine Arjakovsky (FR), Collège des Bernardins

• Rafał Rogulski (PL), European Network Remembrance and Solidarity
• prof. Stéphane Courtois (FR), historian, author of the Black Book of Communism
• prof. Gabriel Andreescu (RO), University of the West, Timișoara
• Marek Mutor (PL), President, Platform of European Memory and Conscience

Virtual tour

17.45 – 18.00

• Tszwai So (UK) – Pan-European Memorial to the Victims of Totalitarianism in Brussels

Walking tour in commemoration of the 33rd anniversary of the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia
Meeting point: Hotel Roma, Újezd 425/24, Praha 1

19.00 – 20.00
Memorial to the Victims of Communism, Újezd
Site of student demonstration and massacre on 17 November 1989, Národní třída

Venue: Liechtenstein Palace, U Sovových mlýnů 506/4 

Translation provided: English, Czech, Russian (Session IV)

• 8.30 – 9.00 registration
• 9.00 Opening speech by Mateusz Morawiecki, Prime Minister of Poland (video)

• 9.10 Remarks by Jan Kalous, Director, XXth Century Memorial Museum
  
• 9.20 Remarks by Kamil Nedvědický, Deputy Director, Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes

Session IV: Dealing with the Communist past – crucial element of democratic transition

9.30 – 11.00
Chair: Jan Kalous, Director, XXth Century Memorial Museum

• Andriy Kohut (UA), Director of the Branch-Wise State Archive of the Ukrainian Security Service
• Jonila Godole (AL), CEO, Institute for Democracy, Media & Culture
• Martin Palouš (CZ), Florida International University’s School of International and Public Affairs, USTR Board Member
• Paweł Ukielski (PL), Deputy Director, Warsaw Rising Museum
• Boris Belenkin (RU), Member of the Board, MEMORIAL
  

11.00 – 11.30 coffee break

Session V: Dealing with the Communist past – what more needs to be done?

11.30 – 13.00
Chair: prof. Hannes Gissurarson (IS), University of Iceland

• Łukasz Kamiński (PL), Director, Ossolineum Institute
• Vladimir Tismăneanu (USA), University of Maryland (online)
• Yanina Sokolova (UA), actress, top-ranking blogger and YouTuber (online)
• Tszwai So (UK), architect, Memorial to the Victims of Totalitarianism in Europe in Brussels
• Nancy Aris (DE), Saxon State Commissioner for the Reappraisal of the SED Dictatorship

Closing remarks

• Garry Kasparov, Russian chess grandmaster, political activist, chairman, Human Rights Foundation, New York (online)