Lukáš Pollert

"What was I doing around 1989 - I wasn't too old, I wasn't working yet, I was a student. In 1989 I was in the second year of university, studying medicine. I was in this strike committee, but that was already after the die had been cast, I think. The die was being cast already a few years before 1989. I also took part in Palach Week and in some demonstrations for the release of Václav Havel and others - there were other political prisoners such as Ivan Martin Jirous etcetera, the list would be pretty long I think. So I was actively participating, but considering my age I was really pretty passive. I only took part with my own person, that wasn't anything special in my opinion."

"Well, I mostly just see the advantages. The freedom we have is amazing in that one can do whatever he wants to, he can not work, he can work - whatever. I mean I can study what I want, I can even not work at all. And that wasn't possible beforehand, especially the not-working."

"In 1988 (the witness means 1989 - ed.), everyone was passing on the Several Sentences, and I also distributed it of course - at the faculty and among my acquaintances - and, well, somehow they caught wind of it at the faculty. It was this one doctor in fact, who figured in this, he did treat people, he was a paediatrician, and I know his name appeared on the Voice of America because he purposefully held up a family with children during an examination, so that State Security could search their house in the meanwhile. And this doctor, I even know his name, but because I know he has a brother who is normal then I'm not sure I should say his name, but it's pointless anyway. But I know that at the time he was shouting at me in the corridor, that during my second year I think, shouting that I definitely wouldn't graduate, that he wouldn't allow me to graduate. And I was already in the team at the time, and so he said he wouldn't tolerate that. And that he would personally see to it that I wouldn't finish my studies."

"So what did you do on November 17th?" - "On November 17th, me and one friend made ourselves a banner - we thought a long time what to put on it - in the end we wrote: 'We don't want violence'. I think on a lot of pictures from that demonstration, if you look at them, our banner became quite well-known through the media. We didn't want to be too provocative, so we chose that slogan, because it was basically the sort of flower-power thing, we're not propagating drugs or unrestrained entertainment, and we don't want violence, so that should be alright. So we made it and we went to Albertov. And it was pretty boring there, some speakers taking turns, but I was surprised - by the large amount of people, already there in Albertov. And I knew one hundred percent, from my experience from other demonstrations, that this would an interesting demonstration. So I really didn't want to go marching of to Vyšehrad, and so straight off we took our banner and went to Albertov and with my friends we tried to lead the procession sort of towards National Avenue or to Wenceslas Square. Because for me it was a pointless waste of time, going through Vyšehrad. And then by coincidence the next day or whenever it was, they wrote there were some instigators there who tried to lead the procession a different way than was agreed upon - so that was me. I didn't want to really, I wanted to go straight off and stand up against the regime, because there were so many people there that it would have been a pity to have lost them along the way, because tiredness would play its part there. But in the end we had to go the long way."