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Alexander Dubcek (1921-92)Czechoslovakian leader. Born on 27 November 1921 in Slovakia, he grew up in the Soviet Union after his family emigrated there when he was four years old. In 1938, he returned and secretly joined the Slovak Communist party. During World War II, he was active in the resistance to Hitler's occupation of Czechoslovakia. After the war, he became a minor party official in the new Communist regime and, in 1951, a member of the Central Committee of the Slovak Communist party. He was then sent back to the Soviet Union for political education. Seven years later, he was appointed to Czechoslovakia's ruling body. He opposed the leadership's conservative policies, arguing that the party needed to reform itself in order to survive and recover its popularity and relevance to the people. When Dubcek became first secretary of the party in January 1968, he started a period of reform – what became known as the 'Prague Spring' – with the aim of creating 'socialism with a human face'. He failed to understand just how unacceptable these policies were to the Soviet Union's hardline leaders, and in August 1968, his country was invaded by Soviet, East German and Polish troops. Disgraced, Dubcek was first sent to Turkey as ambassador. He was then stripped of his party membership and worked as a clerk in a lumber yard in Slovakia. He returned to the limelight – and much popular acclaim – in 1989 when Communist Czechoslovakia collapsed in the 'Velvet Revolution', in the wake of Mikhail Gorbachev's reforms in the Soviet Union. Dubcek was elected speaker of the federal assembly on 28 December 1989, but died three years later after a car accident. |
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