Leaders gather for Havel funeral

WORLD leaders yesterday bade farewell to former Czech president Vaclav Havel, the anti-communist dissident who led the peaceful Velvet Revolution and inspired human rights activists around the world.

Secretary of state Hillary Clinton and her husband Bill, the former US president, joined leaders from France, Britain and many ex-communist countries for the funeral mass in St Vitus cathedral at Prague Castle, the seat of Czech kings and presidents.

Havel, a dissident playwright who died last Sunday at 75 after a long respiratory illness, served five years in jail for his criticism of oppressive communist rule before rising to the presidency of Czechoslovakia in late 1989.