Prague says farewell to Olympic idol Zatopek

The ceremony was held in the Czech capital's 19th-century national theatre with 600 invited guests. Around 2,000 people followed the ceremony on a giant video screen outside the building.

Zatopek's coffin was draped with the Czech flag, with the Olympic flag hanging overhead. He is to be buried at the town of Roznov pod Radhostem.

His widow Dana Zatopkova, an Olympic gold medallist in Helsinki in the javelin, requested that Zatopek not be given a state funeral.

International Olympic Committee president Juan Antonio Samaranch awarded Zatopek posthumously the Pierre de Coubertin medal, the IOC's highest honour.

Zatopek, who won four Olympic gold medals, died on November 21, aged 78 following a stroke.

At the Helsinki Games in 1952 Zatopek won the 5,000 and 10,000 metres and the marathon, each in Olympic record time. Four years earlier, he had won a 10,000 metres gold medal and a silver in the 5,000 metres at the London Olympics.

(kil/dpa)