Mr. Meciar wants to end the 70-year-old Czechoslovak federation in a fast, painless divorce.

By July 1992 the parliament had voted to declare sovereignty and the Czechoslovak federation dissolved peacefully on 1 January 1993.

By contrast, as President of Czechoslovakia between 1990 and 1992 he could not prevent the disintegration of the Czechoslovak federation into its two constituent parts.

The process of abandonment of the Czechoslovak federation had been gathering pace through the previous two months [see pp. 38944-45; 39015].

Since then there have been two republics: the Czech and Slovak republics within the Czechoslovak federation.

At the time, the Czechoslovak federation, a subsidiary of the state sports committee, run by the Communist Government, would not allow players to transfer until they were 30.

The rally today repeated a call to declare the state sovereignty of Slovakia, a move which would break up the Czechoslovak federation.

They are preparing reaction to charges that separatist leaders are currying Soviet support to pry Slovakia from the Czechoslovak federation and should be ousted.

The Civic Democrats, who represented demands for a tighter Czechoslovak federation, began to organise in Slovakia.

This period culminated in November 1992 with the peaceful division of the Czechoslovak federation into two independent states - the Czech and Slovak republics.