A RE-ENACTMENT of a historic World War II battle for control of Ostrô hill, above the road between Ružomberok and Banská Bystrica, attracted more than 2,000 people on September 10. During the World War II Ostrô hill was an important symbol of the 1944 Slovak National Uprising. Twice German soldiers captured the hill and twice the resistance army won it back. If the Nazis and their collaborators had held the site they would have been able to drive their tanks over the mountains towards Banská Bystrica and into the heart of the national uprising.
“We decided to commemorate this history that we should not forget, by not just laying wreaths at the memorial but also through this popular form,” Peter Slimák, the mayor of Ludrová in the Lower Liptov region, told the TASR newswire.
The main organiser of the event, Dušan Rossa of the Ružomberok-based Club of Ostrô Military History (Klub vojenskej histórie Ostrô) said that almost a hundred members of military history clubs from Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Poland participated in the event.
Rossa said this year his club wanted to highlight the importance of Ostrô in the Slovak National Uprising.
From Ostrô hill called the ‘Eye of Liptov’ (Oko Liptova), the military units of the SNP had a lookout point from which they could coordinate activities.
