Jan Zajíc
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Jan Zajíc (3 July 1950-25 February 1969) was a Czech student who committed suicide by self-immolation as a political protest. He was a student at the technical college, specializing in railroads, and was also interested in poetry and humanities.
In 1969 he took part in a hunger strike and a commemoration ceremony by students for Jan Palach near the statue of Saint Wenceslas in Prague. It was probably this event which planted the idea of becoming Palach's successor in Zajíc's mind.
On the day of the twenty-first anniversary of the Communist takeover (25 February 1969), he travelled to Prague accompanied by three other students. His intention was to warn the public against the forthcoming political "normalization" of the country. He had several letters challenging the people to fight against the Soviet military occupation of the Czechoslovak Republic. Around 1:30 in the afternoon he walked into the passageway of the building at No. 39 on Wenceslas Square and ignited his chemical-soaked clothes. He was unable to run out of the door, and collapsed and died in the hallway.
The secret state police prohibited his burial in Prague because they feared demonstrations, such as the ones that followed the burial of Jan Palach. He was later buried in his hometown of Vítkov.
After the Velvet Revolution, a bronze cross was set into the ground in front of the National Museum in Wenceslas Square to honor both Palach and Zajíc.
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