Václav Malý

Václav Malý (born 21 September 1950 in Prague) is a Czech Catholic priest and a prominent persona of the 1989 Velvet Revolution.

During the communist regime period in Czechoslovakia, prior to the Velvet revolution in 1989, Václav Malý was a signatory of Charter 77[4][5] and, in 1978, a founding member of the Committee for the Defense of the Unjustly Prosecuted.

[2] In 1989, during the Velvet Revolution, he was one of the main spokesmen for the Civic Forum[2][6] and a member of the opposition delegation during the negotiations with the government of Ladislav Adamec.

During the 4 December 1989 mass demonstration in Wenceslas Square, he publicly read out the Civic Forum statement demanding free elections the following year and the immediate formation of a coalition government.

In November 2021, Emmanuel Macron, the president of France, awarded Václv Malý with the highest French order of merit, the Legion of Honour, for his personal commitment to human rights.