Five candidates are vying for the position of director of the Lidice Memorial.

Lidice - Five candidates are applying for the position of director of the Lidice Memorial, but the Ministry of Culture has not disclosed their names. The ministry will likely announce the result of the competition on Monday afternoon, spokesperson Michaela Lagronová told ČTK today. Historian Eduard Stehlík confirmed to ČTK last week that he had submitted an application, and according to the media, historian Jiří Nenutil is also interested in the position.

The deadline for submitting applications was Friday; however, for those sent by mail, the date of dispatch is decisive, with one valid application arriving still on Tuesday. "Oral interviews with the individual candidates should take place on Friday," Lagronová stated. One to three candidates who receive the highest scores in the interview will be recommended to the Minister of Culture Lubomír Zaorálek (ČSSD) by the expert committee, who will then select the winner.

The former director of the memorial, Martina Lehmannová, resigned from her position due to a dispute with some Lidice memorialists, and later several leading and professional staff members also resigned.

Zaorálek told ČTK earlier that the new director of the memorial should have a relationship with Lidice, be able to communicate effectively, and earn the trust of all the residents of Lidice. Stehlík is, among other things, the author of two books on the history of Lidice and is an honorary citizen of the municipality. He applied for the competition after Lidice survivors and the leadership of the municipality reached out to him.

Nenutil also has a connection to Lidice; for instance, in early January, he spoke at the funeral of Miloslava Kalibová, who survived the destruction of Lidice.

The Lidice Memorial commemorates the Nazi extermination of the village of Lidice on June 10, 1942. The pretext was the supposed connection of the village to the assassination of Reich Protector Reinhard Heydrich; of the approximately 500 residents of Lidice, 160 survived the war. On June 10, 1942, Nazis shot 173 men in Lidice, and on June 16, 1942, another 26 residents of Lidice were shot in Prague-Kobylisy. Fifty-three women from Lidice did not survive their stay in concentration camps. Eighty-two children from Lidice were suffocated in a gas van at a deportation camp. After liberation, 143 women and 17 children from Lidice gradually returned to Lidice. The memorial also includes the Memorial to Ležáky.