Editing Milan Kundera (section)

==Miroslav Dvořáček controversy==
On 13 October 2008, the Czech weekly ''[[Respekt]]'' reported that an investigation was being carried out by the state-funded historical archive and research [[Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes]],<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.ustrcr.cz/en |title=The Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes |date=2013-05-15 |publisher=Ustrcr.cz |language=cs |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131126102557/http://www.ustrcr.cz/en |archive-date=26 November 2013 |access-date=2013-11-19}}</ref> into whether a young Kundera had denounced a returned defector, Miroslav Dvořáček, to the [[StB]], or Czechoslovak [[secret police]], in 1950.<ref name="respekt">{{Cite web |url=http://english.respekt.cz/Milan-Kunderas-denunciation-2742.html |title=Milan Kundera's denunciation |date=13 October 2008 |website=[[Respekt]] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081014003849/http://english.respekt.cz/Milan-Kunderas-denunciation-2742.html |archive-date=14 October 2008}}</ref> The accusation was based on a police station report which named "Milan Kundera, student, born 1.4.1929" as the informant in regard to Dvořáček's presence at a student dormitory.<ref name="Čulík-2020">{{Cite web |last=Čulík |first=Jan |year=2020 |title=Was Milan Kundera a Bastard? |url=https://eprints.gla.ac.uk/223437/2/223437.pdf |website=[[University of Glasgow]]}}</ref> But the report did not include his ID card number, which was usually included, nor his signature.<ref name="Čulík-2020" /> According to the police report, the ultimate source of the information about Dvořáček's previous desertion from military service and defection to the West was Iva Militká.<ref name="respekt" />

Dvořáček had allegedly fled Czechoslovakia after being ordered to join the infantry in the wake of a purge of the flight academy, and returned to Czechoslovakia as an agent of an [[anti-communist]] espionage agency organised by Czechoslovak exiles, an allegation which was not mentioned in the police report.<ref name="respekt" /> Dvořáček returned secretly to the student dormitory of a friend's ex-girlfriend, Iva Militká. Militká was dating and later married a fellow student, Ivan Dlask, who knew Kundera.<ref name="respekt" /> The police report alleges that Militká told Dlask of Dvořáček's presence, and that Dlask told Kundera, who told the secret police.<ref name="respekt" /> Although the prosecutor sought the death penalty, Dvořáček was sentenced to 22 years of hard labour, fined 10,000 [[Czechoslovak koruna|crowns]], stripped of personal property, and deprived of his civic rights for ten years.<ref name="respekt" /> Dvořáček served 14 years in a [[labor camp]], some of it working in a [[uranium]] mine, before he was released.<ref name="times">{{cite web |last1=Pancevski |first1=Bojan |title=Milan Kundera denies spy tip-off claims |url=https://www.thetimes.com/best-law-firms/profile-legal/article/milan-kundera-denies-spy-tip-off-claims-67p2jgzn3gw |website=[[The Times]] |archive-url=https://archive.today/20211125020816/https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/milan-kundera-denies-spy-tip-off-claims-67p2jgzn3gw |archive-date=2021-11-25 |location=Vienna |date=2008-10-14 |url-status=live}}</ref>

In his response to ''Respekt''{{'}}s announcement, Kundera denied turning Dvořáček into the StB,<ref name="times" /> stating he never knew him at all, and could not even remember an individual named "Militká".<ref>[http://video.respekt.cz/Kundera-Je-to-nefer-2767.html] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081017084437/http://video.respekt.cz/Kundera-Je-to-nefer-2767.html|date=17 October 2008}}</ref> On 14 October 2008, the Czech Security Forces Archive announced that they had ruled out the possibility that the document could be a forgery, but refused to arrive at any other definite conclusions.<ref name="ctk">{{Cite web|url=https://www.ceskenoviny.cz/news/index_view.php?id=338644|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20150103005213/http://www.ceskenoviny.cz/news/index_view.php?id=338644|url-status=dead|title=&#124;|archivedate=3 January 2015|website=ceskenoviny.cz}}</ref> Vojtech Ripka of the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes said, "There are two pieces of circumstantial evidence [the police report and its sub-file], but we, of course, cannot be one hundred percent sure. Unless we find all survivors, which is unfortunately impossible, it will not be complete." Ripka added that the signature on the police report matches the name of a man who worked in the corresponding National Security Corps section and that a police protocol is missing.<ref name="ctk" />

Many in the Czech Republic condemned Kundera as a "police informer", while many others accused ''Respekt'' of committing journalistic misconduct by publishing such a poorly researched piece. On the other hand, presenting an ID card was a procedure whenever dealing with the StB in 1950. Kundera was the student representative of the dorm Dvořáček had visited, and while it cannot be ruled out that another student could have denounced him to the StB using Kundera's name,<ref name="Čulík-2020" /> impersonating someone else in a [[Stalinist]] [[police state]] posed a significant risk. Contradictory statements by Kundera's fellow students appeared in the Czech news media in the wake of this scandal. Historian Adam Hradílek, the co-author of the ''Respekt'' article, was also accused of an undeclared conflict of interest since one of the individuals involved in the incident was his aunt.<ref name="Čulík-2020" /> Nonetheless, ''Respekt'' states on its website that its task is to "impartially study the crimes of the former communist regime".<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.ustrcr.cz/ |title=Ústav pro studium totalitních režimů |date=15 November 2013 |publisher=Ustrcr.cz |language=cs |access-date=19 November 2013}}</ref> With time, the Western journalists realized the whole controversy was flawed, with French newspapers defending Kundera.<ref name="Čulík-2020" /> The literary scholar Karen de Kunes investigated the reports and came to the conclusion that even if Kundera had issued the report, all he reported was the existence of a suitcase in the hallway.<ref name="Čulík-2020" />

On 3 November 2008, eleven internationally recognized writers came to Kundera's defence, including four Nobel laureates, [[Orhan Pamuk]], [[Gabriel García Márquez]], [[Nadine Gordimer]] and [[J. M. Coetzee]], as well as [[Carlos Fuentes]], [[Juan Goytisolo]], [[Philip Roth]], [[Salman Rushdie]], and [[Jorge Semprún]].<ref>{{Cite news |last=Coetzee |first=J. M. |url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2008/nov/04/milankundera-nobel-prize-literature |title=Support Milan Kundera |date=4 November 2008 |work=The Guardian |access-date=23 August 2010 |location=London}}</ref>