"When the first wave of those huge rains came, we were just at the Hrabyně memorial, I remember it like today, where there was a memorial ceremony for General Heliodor Pika. My wife and I were coming back through Ostrava and the small streams became big rivers. I got out of our private car in Olomouc. My wife went on to Brno, I went straight to the headquarters and already started to receive the first reports on how things were looking. The situation was very complicated in that an incredible amount of water was pouring down on all the mountains - Jeseníky, Beskydy, Oderské Hills and others, flowing down all the slopes and the rivers were not taking it. It went from the Jeseníky region through Ostrava and central Moravia to basically the border with Slovakia. Cross-border cooperation began because the Odra River flows into Poland, the Morava flows into Slovakia and beyond, and the Dyje flows into Slovakia and beyond. We have had to deal with a whole range of issues related to aid. And there was one more specificity at that time: the legislation did not know any terms like integrated rescue system. The responsibility was with the Army of the Czech Republic and the individual units of the Firefighters and Rescue Service, the police, and others. In my opinion, it was a very wise decision by President Václav Havel and Defence Minister Miroslav Výborný to transfer responsibility for the management of the Central Crisis Command to the Commander of the Army Corps. I knew the territory, I knew which mayors, which chiefs - at that time district offices were still functioning - to turn to. And the chiefs and mayors knew where to call and ask for help. It started in Jesenicko, and went through Ostrava to Moravia. And we collected all the requests from the state and local government officials at the headquarters. I had all the units under me, that is, I had representatives of the air force, logistics, there was one deputy minister of the interior, there were representatives of the Ministry of the Environment, but the decisive voice was the staff of the Second Army Corps, the commander of the Second Army Corps.“
"We had an embassy that wasn't in the protected green zone, as it was called. We were - and the embassy is still there today - in the Al-Mansour district, that's the southwestern part [of Baghdad] next to the Hussein Mosque that was under construction. We had several missions: first, to restore economic relations, because Czechoslovakia was very well established in Iraq. Helping to rebuild the refineries. Our specialists and companies were there. I will just digress: I remember that when I went to see them at the refinery, they said to me: 'Mr Ambassador, we are here like in prison. We can't go anywhere, we can't get anywhere. I said, 'Guys, imagine that I have been living here like this for three years.' The situation was not easy, and the embassy had two security circuits. The first one was secured by the excellent teams of the Rapid Deployment Unit of the Police of the Czech Republic. I can't get enough of them, they're pros all around. The outer perimeter was secured by Iraqi security forces. In 2006, we opened a branch of our embassy in Iraqi Kurdistan, in Erbil. A year later, we opened the commercial and economic section of the embassy in the south of Iraq in Basra. A year later, we opened the commercial and economic section of the embassy in Basra in southern Iraq. We managed to build a children's first aid hospital in Baghdad for children affected by the war with the help of Czech government subsidies. A rehabilitation centre has been set up there. We trained doctors and nurses. In the north, we managed to repair the fourteenth-century Choli minaret. Two dams were built to hold back water from the mountains. So we've done a tremendous amount of work. And as Deputy Minister Bašta said, when he came to Erbil to open our office at that time, he said, 'You know, we are not here for oil. We are here for the people.'"
"All the purchases were made for us by the so-called local forces, the Iraqis who worked at the embassy. When we went to different meetings, we would go in a convoy, an armoured vehicle in the front, and an armoured vehicle in the back. The URNA officers (Czech analogue of SWAT) were always going over the routes, finding escape routes. We just worked 17 hours a day, seven days a week. We didn't get out of the embassy. Except in the north, that region of Iraqi Kurdistan was relatively safe, and you could go to the club there in the evening, to mass, because there was a strong Christian community. For example, I arranged for the Christian community, for the Bishop, His Excellency, and about 20 Christians to visit Prague, Rome, and other cities. By then we were already in Schengen, so they got Schengen visas. It was relatively more cheerful there."
Petr Voznica, a soldier and diplomat, was born on 7 November 1954 in Karviná and grew up in nearby Orlová. He grew up in a working-class environment. His father worked as a locksmith and was expelled from the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (KSČ) in 1968 for his activities. From childhood, Petr was interested in chemistry, so after primary school, he decided to study at the Secondary Industrial School (SPŠ) of Chemistry in Ostrava. He continued his studies at the University of Land Forces, focusing on toxicology and nuclear chemistry. In 1975, he joined the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia. After graduation in 1977, he went through various army positions, among others teaching his field of study at military colleges. Since 1994 he has served as Deputy Commander of the 2nd Army Corps of the Czech Army. In 1996, he received a scholarship to the British Royal College of Defence Studies, where he studied strategy and international relations. During the floods in Moravia in 1997, he coordinated the activities of the 2nd Army Corps, firefighters, police, the Red Cross, and other rescue services. President Václav Havel awarded him the Medal of Merit, First Class. During 2001-2005 he served as Czech Ambassador to Lithuania, and for the following four years, he was Czech Ambassador to Iraq. His diplomatic career ended with a five-year appointment as Ambassador to Slovenia.
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