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☆ Vista Outdoor agrees deal to sell its ammunition and sporting goods divisions for $3.4 billion
▼ + stars: | 2024-10-05 | by ( Rebecca Rommen | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Vista Outdoor has announced a deal to sell its two divisions for $3.4 billion. It is set to sell Revelyst, its sporting goods business, for around $1.13 billion. That deal is subject to the completion of the sale of its ammunition business, Kinetic Group, for about $2.23 billion. Advertisement"Together, the CSG Transaction and the SVP Transaction represent an enterprise value of $3.35 billion for Vista Outdoor and will deliver an estimated $45 per share in cash to Vista Outdoor stockholders," the press release says. AdvertisementCzechoslovak Group is being advised by JPMorgan on the new deal, while Morgan Stanley is advising Vista Outdoor.

Persons: —, Michael Callahan, Morgan Stanley, Vista's Organizations: Kinetic, Service, Partners, Czechoslovak Group, CSG, Vista, Vista Outdoor, Reuters, JPMorgan, Moelis, Company Locations: Minnesota, Prague

☆ Vista Outdoor strikes deal to sell itself in parts to two buyers for $3.4 billion
▼ + stars: | 2024-10-05 | by ( ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +4 min

Vista struck a deal to sell its sporting goods unit, Revelyst, to investment firm Strategic Value Partners for $1.1 billion, according to a statement seen by Reuters. Taken together, the two deals value Vista at $45 per share, topping a rival $43 per share offer from MNC Capital, an investment firm led by former Vista board member Mark Gottfredson. The sale of Revelyst is expected to close by January, subject to regulatory approvals and the completion of the CSG deal. In June, the CSG deal was cleared by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, which reviews foreign investments over possible national security concerns. In July, Vista launched a strategic review to explore all its options, after failing to gather investor support for the CSG deal.

Persons: Vista, Mark Gottfredson, Michael Callahan, Glass Lewis, David Geenberg, MNC's, Victor Khosla, Morgan Stanley, Moelis, Goldman Sachs Organizations: Flag, New York Stock Exchange, Partners, Reuters, Czechoslovak Group, CSG, MNC Capital, Vista, MNC, Institutional, Services, Federal, Remington, Foresight, Bushnell Golf, North, Foreign Investment, Strategic Value Partners, JPMorgan Locations: U.S, Prague, Revelyst, Minnesota, Russia, Ukraine, North America, United States, Colleyville , Texas

☆ Olympics 2024: What to watch at the gymnastics in Paris
▼ + stars: | 2024-07-27 | by ( Kyle Feldscher | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

Paris CNN —As competition gets well and truly underway in Paris, all eyes will turn shortly to one of the Olympic Games’ signature sports: Gymnastics. Biles comes to Paris aiming to wash away the disappointment of that Games, and has been on an absolute tear heading into Paris. She returns in Paris looking to match the feat of Czechoslovak gymnast Vera Caslavska in 1964 and 1968. While Biles and Lee are competing against each other in Paris, the two will also be teammates in the team competition that gets underway on Tuesday. Daiki Hashimoto is also aiming to equal his countryman Kohei Uchimura’s accomplishments in London and Rio de Janeiro by winning his second straight all-around gold medal.

Persons: Simone Biles, ”, USA’s, –, Biles, She’ll, Suni Lee, Lee, Vera Caslavska, Japan’s, Daiki Hashimoto, Kohei Uchimura’s, Varfolomeev Organizations: Paris CNN —, Olympic, Bercy, Team USA, US, Russian Olympic, Paris Games, Rio de Janeiro, Japan, NBC, USA, Globo •, CBC, •, ARD, ZDF, Fuji, NHK, Nippon, SKY, SuperSport • United, BBC, Discovery Eurosport Locations: Paris, Tokyo, American, Russia, Russian, Japan, London, Rio de, China, Rio, German, City of Light, Brazil, Globo • Canada, France, • Germany, New Zealand, Africa, SuperSport • United Kingdom, Europe

☆ A major ammo supplier to Ukraine says poor quality parts are impacting half the shells it's trying to deliver
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-30 | by ( Mia Jankowicz | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

download the appSign up to get the inside scoop on today’s biggest stories in markets, tech, and business — delivered daily. Read previewCentral Europe's largest ammunition supplier said that quality and cost issues meant that half of the shells it's sourcing for Ukraine can't be sent directly to the country, according to the Financial Times. In January, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said that the war in Ukraine had "become a battle for ammunition." Ukraine has been forced to limit itself to firing 2,000 shells per day for much of this year, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said. AdvertisementAnd it's only been since mid-May that its forces have started to breathe more easily over their ability to expend shells, Zelenskyy said.

Persons: —, Michal Strnad, Strnad, Strnad's, Jens Stoltenberg, Sinéad Baker, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Zelenskyy Organizations: Service, Financial Times, Czechoslovak Group, Business, CSG, Radio Free, NATO, Reuters Locations: Ukraine, Czech, Asia, Africa, Prague, Russia

Raised stakes in a firearms takeover contestA battle over Vista Outdoor, the company behind top ammunition brands like Remington and Camelbak water bottles, is escalating — and national security is becoming a bigger factor in the fight. MNC is offering $37.50 a share for all of Vista, up from a bid of $35 last month and 16 percent higher than where Vista’s stock closed on Friday. In a letter to Vista’s board reviewed by DealBook, the investment firm reiterated that it had lined up financing for its offer, despite questions by Vista about how solid those commitments were. Vista rejected MNC’s previous offer, saying a planned breakup of itself would be more valuable for shareholders. (Vista has agreed to sell its ammunition business to CSG for $1.9 billion, leaving its nonfirearm division, Revelyst, as a stand-alone public company.)

Persons: DealBook, Vista Organizations: Vista, Remington, MNC Capital, Czechoslovak, MNC, CSG Locations: U.S, Vista

PRAGUE (AP) — František Janouch, a Czech nuclear physicist who set up a foundation in Sweden while in exile to support the dissident movement in his communist homeland at the time, has died. The Charter 77 Foundation said Janouch died on Friday morning in Sweden's capital, Stockholm, where he had lived since the 1970s. Born on Sept. 22, 1931 in the town of Lysa nad Labem near Prague, Janouch studied nuclear physics at Charles University in Prague and at universities in Moscow and St. Petersburg in the then Soviet Union. Political Cartoons View All 253 ImagesAt the invitation of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, he moved to Sweden in 1974. “František Janouch contributed significantly to the return of freedom to our country,” Prime Minister Petr Fiala said.

Persons: Janouch, Václav Havel, Havel, “ František Janouch, Petr Fiala Organizations: Charles University, Nuclear Physics Institute, Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences, Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences Locations: PRAGUE, Czech, Sweden, Sweden's, Stockholm, Lysa nad Labem, Prague, Moscow, St, Petersburg, Soviet Union, Soviet, Czechoslovakia, Swedish

☆ A Video Game That Doubles as a World War I History Lesson
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-29 | by ( Samuel Horti | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

When the video game producer Petr Kolar and his future colleagues made a research trip to the Legiovlak, a replica World War I-era train that chugs around the Czech Republic, he noted the pristine Czechoslovak Legion uniforms worn by the museum guides. “The Legion were like gentlemen fighting,” said Kolar, who co-founded Ashborne Games after that visit. That’s one of the reasons 70,000 men could control the whole Trans-Siberian Railway.”Foregrounding historical accuracy was a priority for Ashborne’s first original game, Last Train Home, which retells the Legion’s rolling evacuation eastward across Russia in the embers of the war. Its journey for homebound ships at the port of Vladivostok was tangled in Russia’s internal conflict between Bolshevik and anti-Bolshevik armies. World War II has been the dominant historical battlefield in video games, from the Medal of Honor franchise and early Call of Duty titles to Hell Let Loose, a multiplayer recreation of the war’s various fronts that pits two teams of 50 against each other.

Persons: Petr Kolar, ”, Kolar, “ Organizations: Ashborne Games, Siberian Railway, Bolshevik Locations: Czech Republic, Russia, Vladivostok

☆ Czech gunmaker Colt CZ makes offer for Vista Outdoor
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-23 | by ( Jason Hovet | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

Visitors look at firearms from Colt CZ Group at the Milipol Paris, the worldwide exhibition dedicated to homeland security and safety, in Villepinte near Paris, France, November 15, 2023. REUTERS/Sarah Meyssonnier/File Photo Acquire Licensing RightsPRAGUE, Nov 23 (Reuters) - Czech gunmaker Colt CZ Group (CZG.PR) has made a cash-and-stock merger offer to Vista Outdoor (VSTO.N), valuing the U.S. sporting and outdoor goods group's shares at a 16% premium. Colt CZ said it proposed keeping the company together, scrapping plans to separate Vista at this time. Colt CZ, along with a majority shareholder and its chairman, together acquired more than 5% of Vista shares, they announced in October. Colt CZ shares fell around 3% at the Prague open on Thursday but had recovered to trade nearly 1% higher by 1053 GMT.

Persons: Sarah Meyssonnier, Colt CZ's, Vista, Colt, Jason Hovet, Mark Potter Organizations: Colt CZ, REUTERS, Rights, Vista, Czechoslovak Group, Czechoslovak, Colt, CSG, Thomson Locations: Paris, Villepinte, France, Czech, U.S, Vista, Prague

UKRAINE DIVERSIONReuters spoke to around a half dozen Czech and Polish defence companies and government officials who described renewed efforts to carve out a bigger share of the African arms market as the Ukraine conflict diverts Russia's attention. Privately-held defence and civil manufacturing company Czechoslovak Group - the biggest Czech defence company - said its ability to maintain and modernize armoured vehicles using Soviet-era standards has helped it win business in Africa. ...in Poland where our stand was visited by numerous delegations from African countries that appeared here for the first time," WB Group spokesman Remigiusz Wilk said. The effort to supply Ukraine has pushed Czech companies to boost production and expand supply lines, something Czech-based independent defence analyst Lukas Visingr said has burnished the region's reputation. "The Czech arms industry is stepping up its efforts towards certain African countries still using Soviet-style equipment but who start to see Russia as a problematic supplier," Visingr said.

Persons: David W Cerny, Jiri Hynek, Filip Kulstrunk, Andrej Cirtek, Pieter Wezeman, Sebastian Chwalek, –, Remigiusz Wilk, Petr Fiala, Tomas Pojar, Tomas Kopecny, Kopecny, Lukas Visingr, Visingr, Michael Kahn, Anna Koper, Alex Richardson Organizations: Aero Vodochody, REUTERS, Western, Central, Russia Czech, Defence, Western NATO, Warsaw, Defence and Security Industry Association of, Reuters, Aero, Privately, Czechoslovak Group, CSG, Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, WB Group, WB, Ivory, Thomson Locations: Odolena Voda, Czech Republic, Russia, Africa, PRAGUE, WARSAW, European, Western, Czechoslovakia, Czech, UKRAINE, Polish, Ukraine, Stockholm, China, Saharan Africa, Poland's, Poland, Ethiopia, Kenya, Ghana, Prague, Mozambique

☆ Vista Outdoor to sell sporting products unit in $1.91 bln deal, cuts sales forecast
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-16 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

Oct 16 (Reuters) - Vista Outdoor (VSTO.N) said on Monday it would sell its sporting products business in a $1.91 billion deal, although its shares tumbled about 20% in early trading after it cut its full-year sales forecast. The all-cash sale of the sporting products unit, which includes its guns and ammunition business, to privately held Czechoslovak Group a.s. (CSG) is expected to close next calendar year, Vista Outdoor said. Earlier this month, Vista spun off its outdoor products segment, which includes helmets and water bottles, into a separate publicly traded company called Revelyst as part of its previously announced plan. Vista said in a call with analysts and investors that the separation of its sporting and outdoor goods units will be formalized at the closing of its deal with CSG. CSG said it plans to take $1.11 billion of debt financing to fund the deal with Vista Outdoor.

Persons: Andy Keegan, Vista, Fiocchi Munizioni, Juveria Tabassum, Jason Hovet, Jan Lopatka, Savio D'Souza, Shweta Agarwal Organizations: Vista, CSG, Thomson Locations: Ukraine, Prague

☆ Putin: Sending Soviet Tanks Into Hungary and Czechoslovakia Was a Mistake
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-12 | by ( Sept. | At A.M. | ) www.usnews.com time to read: +1 min

VLADIVOSTOK, Russia (Reuters) -Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday that the Soviet Union's decision to send tanks into Hungary and Czechoslovakia to crush mass protests during the Cold War was a mistake. "It was a mistake," Putin said when asked about perceptions of Russia as a colonial power due to Moscow's decision to send tanks into Budapest in 1956 and into Prague in 1968. Putin said the United States was making the same mistakes as the Soviet Union. The 1956 Hungarian Uprising was crushed by Soviet tanks and troops. At least 2,600 Hungarians and 600 Soviet troops were killed in the fighting.

Persons: Vladimir Putin, Putin, Washington, Guy Faulconbridge, Mark Trevelyan Organizations: Soviet, Czechoslovak Locations: VLADIVOSTOK, Russia, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Budapest, Prague, Ukraine, Europe, United States, Soviet Union, Soviet, Warsaw, Czechoslovak Socialist Republic, Czech

☆ Putin: sending Soviet tanks into Hungary and Czechoslovakia was a mistake
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-12 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

Russian President Vladimir Putin listens to a report presentation on the development of Russia's far eastern regions held via a video link in Vladivostok, Russia, September 11, 2023. Sputnik/Vyacheslav Prokofyev/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo Acquire Licensing RightsVLADIVOSTOK, Russia, Sept 12 (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday that the Soviet Union's decision to send tanks into Hungary and Czechoslovakia to crush mass protests during the Cold War was a mistake. "It was a mistake," Putin said when asked about perceptions of Russia as a colonial power due to Moscow's decision to send tanks into Budapest in 1956 and into Prague in 1968. The 1956 Hungarian Uprising was crushed by Soviet tanks and troops. At least 2,600 Hungarians and 600 Soviet troops were killed in the fighting.

Persons: Vladimir Putin, Vyacheslav Prokofyev, Putin, Washington, Guy Faulconbridge, Mark Trevelyan Organizations: Rights, Soviet, Czechoslovak, Thomson Locations: Vladivostok, Russia, Rights VLADIVOSTOK, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Budapest, Prague, Ukraine, Europe, United States, Soviet Union, Soviet, Warsaw, Czechoslovak Socialist Republic, Czech

☆ Milan Kundera dies, reclusive literary giant and author of 'The Unbearable Lightness of Being
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-12 | by ( Ivana Kottasová | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

“Milan Kundera, a Czech-French author who is among the world’s most translated authors, died on July 11, 2023 in his Paris apartment,” the library, a state-funded research organization, said in a statement. The author of “The Unbearable Lightness of Being,” Kundera was known for his witty, tragicomic tales, which were often intertwined with deep philosophical debates and satirical portrayals of life under communist oppression. Exile in ParisHe spent the rest of his life in exile in Paris, becoming a French citizen in 1981. While his Czech citizenship was restored in 2019, he was by then a French author whose home was in France. Kundera, having spent more than two decades living in seclusion and declining to do interviews, took the unusual step of speaking up.

Persons: Milan Kundera, “ Milan Kundera, ” Kundera, Kundera, ”, “, Daniel Day, Lewis, Juliette Binoche, Respekt, Vaclav Havel Organizations: CNN, Moravian, Communist Party, Czech, Czech Institute Locations: Czech, Paris, Brno, French, Czechoslovakia, Prague, Soviet, France

[1/3] Writer Milan Kundera is pictured in Prague, former Czechoslovakia, May 6, 1963. CTK Photo/Frantisek Nesvadba via REUTERSPRAGUE, July 12 (Reuters) - Czech-born writer Milan Kundera, author of the novel "The Unbearable Lightness of Being" who lived nearly five decades in Paris after emigrating in disillusionment from his Communist-ruled homeland, has died at the age of 94. French Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne said Kundera was "a writer and a voice that we will miss". "Milan Kundera's work is at the same time a deep, human, intimate and distant exploration," she said. Fellow Czech writer Karel Hvizdala told Czech Television he saw his friend last November and he was already in poor health.

Persons: Milan Kundera, Frantisek Nesvadba, Kundera, Petr Fiala, Petr Pavel, Pavel, Elisabeth Borne, Milan, Karel Hvizdala, Albert Camus, Daniel Day, Lewis, Juliette Binoche, Philip Kaufman, Timothy Garton Ash, Monde, Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo, Czechoslovakia's, Jan Lopatka, Robert Muller, Elizabeth Pineau, Tassilo Hummel, Michael Kahn, Jason Hovet, Toby Chopra, Kevin Liffey, Mark Heinrich, Nick Macfie Organizations: CTK, REUTERS, Moravian, Prague Spring, Czech Television, Czechoslovak Communist, New York Times, Oxford University, Paris Mayor, Czechoslovakia's Communist, Thomson Locations: Prague, Czechoslovakia, REUTERS PRAGUE, Czech, Paris, Brno, France, Communist Czechoslovakia, Czechoslovak, Europe, Central Europe, French, Western

☆ A pig farm on the site of a Nazi 'Roma camp' is finally demolished. After decades of campaigning, Czech victims of Roma Holocaust are getting their memorial
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-03 | by ( Ivana Kottasová | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +18 min

He had spent decades campaigning for the pig farm to be torn down. Jana Kokyová is the chair of the Committee for the Redress of the Roma Holocaust in the Czech Republic. “During communism and even long after the revolution, nobody wanted to admit there was such a thing as a Roma Holocaust, it was not something you would speak about openly.”Many of Rudolf Murka's ancestors perished in the Roma Holocaust. However, it took another two decades for the government to finally act on the most obvious symbol of anti-Roma discrimination, the Lety pig farm. Čeněk Růžička poses with a pick during the official start of the demolition of the industrial pig farm on the site of the Lety camp.

Persons: Czech Republic CNN — Čeněk, “, ”, Jana Kokyová, Růžička’s, Ivana Kottasova, Bětka, Bětka’s, grandma, ” Kokyová, Kokyová, Růžičková, Růžičková’s, Čeněk, ” Růžička, Rudolf Murka, ” Murka, Jana Horváthová, –, Horváthová, “ It’s, Sinti, Murka, “ We’d, we’d, Rudolf Murka's, Josef Serinek, Zdenek Serinek’s, Josef, Zdenek, Marie Zemanová, grandpa, ‘ White, ’ ” Zdenek, Tomas Novak, Andrej Babiš, ” Václav Klaus, ” Horváthová, Růžička, Tibor Danihel, Václav Havel, Tibor Berki, ’ ”, Berki’s, Petr Pavel, Havel’s Organizations: Czech Republic CNN, Nazi, Communist, Roma, Czech Committee, CNN, Moravian Roma, Czech, of Romani, Czech government’s, Roma Minority Affairs, Czechoslovak, Former, Czech Helsinki Committee, CNN Roma, Getty Locations: Czech Republic, Lety, Prague, Roma, Bohemia, Moravia, Europe, Auschwitz, Germany, Czech, German Nazi, Hodonín, Brno, Europe’s Roma, West Germany, Czechoslovak, Czech Helsinki, Písek, South Moravia, “

☆ Indonesia confirms buying used fighter jets for $800 million after deal criticised
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-14 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

JAKARTA, June 14 (Reuters) - Indonesia confirmed on Wednesday it had bought 12 Mirage 2000-5 fighter jets previously used by Qatar, defending the nearly $800 million deal as a fast way to upgrade the air force after it was criticised by lawmakers who said the planes were too old. The defence ministry said in a statement that Indonesia had signed the deal for 733 million euros ($792 million) with Excalibur International a.s., a unit of Czech defence company Czechoslovak Group (CSG) in January. The country has long been seeking to overhaul its ageing air fleet which includes U.S.-made F-16 and Russian Sukhoi Su-27 and Su-30 jets. The country secured a deal to order 42 Rafale fighter jets for $8.1 billion in February. A planned purchase of F-15 fighter jets is also in advanced stages and awaiting final sign-off from the government, defence minister Prabowo Subianto said last year.

Persons: Tubagus Hasanuddin, Edwin Adrian Sumantha, Sukhoi Su, Prabowo Subianto, Ananda Teresia, Gayatri Suroyo, Peter Graff Organizations: Czechoslovak Group, Dassault Aviation, Indonesian Air, Thomson Locations: JAKARTA, Indonesia, Qatar, Czech, U.S, Russia, Jakarta

☆ Fact Check-Photo shows pool in Slovak labour camp, not Nazi concentration camp
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-28 | by ( Reuters Fact Check | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +5 min

Online posts, however, miscaption the photo with the names of infamous concentration camps, such as Auschwitz, or falsely characterize the actual Slovak labour camp in the photo, Nováky, as a Nazi-run concentration camp. Senior historian at Yad Vashem Robert Rozett told Reuters via email that Nováky was not a concentration camp. UPN’s Jašek said that having a swimming pool was not usual for Slovak concentration and forced-labour camps. EXTERMINATION, CONCENTRATION CAMPSPaweł Sawicki, a spokesperson for the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum (here), told Reuters via email that concentration camps and extermination camps were different to forced-labour camps. The photo shows a forced-labour camp in Slovakia, where, according to three historians, conditions were different to those at Nazi-run concentration camps.

[1/2] A Vietnamese officer tries a weapon at the stalls of Czech security firms, including Colt, at the Vietnam International Defence Expo 2022 in Hanoi, Vietnam, December 8, 2022. REUTERS/Khanh VuHANOI, April 24 (Reuters) - Vietnam is in talks with the Czech Republic for military supplies, including aircraft, radars, upgrades of armoured vehicles and firearms, a Czech government source told Reuters, as Hanoi aims at diversifying its mostly Russian arsenal. Hanoi ordered a dozen L-39NG light-combat aircraft in 2021 from Czech manufacturer Aero Vodochody, with delivery to begin this year. Of the 15 companies that composed the Czech business delegation, four were security firms. The Vietnam foreign ministry and the Czech embassy in Hanoi had no immediate comment.

☆ Slovak film director Jakubisko dies
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-25 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

Feb 25 (Reuters) - Slovak film director Juraj Jakubisko, who was named the best director of the 20th century in his country and dubbed the "Fellini of the East", has died at the age of 84, Slovak public broadcaster RTVS said on Saturday. Jakubisko died in Prague, where he lived, his daughter told RTVS. The director studied film in the 1960s in Prague, joining a generation of Czechoslovak New Wave film-makers and released his feature debut, the autobiographical "The Prime of Life" (Kristove Roky), in 1967. Jakubisko returned to feature film-making in the 1980s, with Federico Fellini’s wife, Giulietta Masina, starring in his fairy tale "Perinbaba" in 1985. He released "Bathory", his first English-language film, in 2008 to tell the story of Hungarian Countess Elizabeth Bathory, thought to be one of the world's most notorious serial killers.

Allies have been supplying Kyiv with weapons and military equipment since Russia invaded its neighbour on Feb. 24, depleting their own inventories along the way. HISTORIC INDUSTRYEastern Europe's arms industry dates back to the 19th Century, when Czech Emil Skoda began manufacturing weapons for the Austro-Hungarian Empire. They said Ukraine had acquired weapons and equipment via donations from governments and direct commercial contracts between Kyiv and the manufacturers. "At the same time it's an opportunity for them to build up their military production industry." Czech arms exports this year will be the highest since 1989, he said, with many companies in the sector adding jobs and capacity.

☆ A TALK WITH MILAN KUNDERA
▼ + stars: | 1985-05-19 | by ( Olga Carlisle | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

The nature of his achievement may explain in part why Kundera is so fiercely protective of his privacy. Warned by mutual friends that the Soviet subjugation of his country had made Kundera mistrustful of Russians - all Russians - I felt I should mention my Russian origin. MILAN KUNDERA AND HIS WIFE, VERA, LIVE ON ONE of the quiet sidestreets of Montparnasse; their small apartment is a remodeled garret with a view of dove-gray Parisian roofs. Some are by Czechoslovak artists; the others are by Kundera himself - multicolored outsized heads and long-fingered hands, like Kundera's own. Vera Kundera is a pretty brunette, hair cut short, slender in blue jeans.

Persons: Philip Roth, Kundera, I'm, Leonid Andreyev, VERA, garret, Vera Kundera, Vera Organizations: MILAN Locations: Paris, San Francisco, Montparnasse, Czechoslovak, Bon Marche

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