Czech Republic: Police preparing for five anti-Roma marches organized by neo-Nazis tomorrow around the country
Police are intensively preparing for anti-Roma marches that have been announced by right-wing extremists for Saturday, 24 August in five towns around the Czech Republic so far. Police Presidium spokesperson has Ivana Ježková published a list of the demonstration locations on the presidium website.
According to the police, assemblies will be held in České Budějovice, Duchcov, Jičín, Ostrava and Plzeň. The spokesperson did not want to give details as to how many officers are to be deployed this weekend.
The regional police directorates in each locality will reportedly communicate those details later. "We never publicize that we have a certain number of officers prepared for action. It would not be tactical," Ježková said.
The police spokesperson said police are still evaluating and refining the information available to them. "The Police Presidium is the coordinator that will arrange for any eventual transfers of forces should the need arise," she said.
According to the Law on Assembly, demonstrations must be announced to the relevant town hall five days before they will be held. "Given that the authorities can accept announcements within a shorter time frame in justified cases, this list of towns and villages is not necessarily final," Ježková said.
Local authorities cannot directly ban an announced event. However, they can ask the courts to ban it.
Protest against neo-Nazis in Ostrava
The marches across the country against "Romani crime" are being convened by neo-Nazis through the "Svobodný odpor" (Free Resistance) website. According to that website, the event in Ostrava should start at 14:00, roughly one hour earlier than the other assemblies will. "This will be one of the biggest events in terms of the number of participants," the neo-Nazi website says of Ostrava’s demonstration.
Opponents of the neo-Nazis, however, have reserved places around town where the neo-Nazi demonstration was to have taken place and are preparing to protest against it. According to organizer Josef Stojka, the counter-protest will take the form of a peaceful "happening".
"Through our demonstration, we want to show that we disagree with the continually growing number of neo-Nazi, racist marches. Many Romani people know about this event, from all localities, and they will participate in large numbers – I believe there will be an unprecedented number of Romani people participating here in Ostrava," organizer Jolana Šmarhovyčová said.
The Roma are planning musical performances, including of the Czech and Roma anthems, as well as speeches. They believe the police will protect them and prevent any eventual clashes.
"Everyone is afraid, afraid for their children, for their homes, and for their safety, but we are no longer afraid to stand up to them [the right-wing extremists]," Stojka said. He believes the Romani demonstrators do not want to foment violence, but he did admit that if the Roma are attacked they are prepared to defend themselves.
Mayor of Duchcov legitimizes neo-Nazi DSSS once again
In the town of Duchcov (Ústí Region) neo-Nazis demonstrations have taken place frequently in recent months. The fourth such event in a row will take place there tomorrow.
The event is being convened by the local organization of the right-wing extremist Workers’ Social Justice Party (Dělnická strana sociální spravedlnosti – DSSS). The third such demonstration in Duchcov, which was convened by the neo-Nazi group "Czech Lions" (Čeští lvi) on 17 August, ended up being a fiasco.
Only 40 people came to the 17 August event, which took place without disrupting public order. DSSS extremists are now calling on the residents of the town to turn out in their highest possible numbers for tomorrow’s event.
Mayor of Duchcov Jitka Bártová, who last week dissuaded people from participating in the "Czech Lions" event, is not being as critical of tomorrow’s demonstration and has legitimized the activity of the local DSSS extremists more than once. The "Czech Lions" are a breakaway faction of the DSSS and have very bad relations with the party.
"The fact that this demonstration is being convened by the DSSS doesn’t exactly fill me with enthusiasm, but they are Duchcov residents, they insist they will ensure the event proceeds calmly, and they claim they don’t want to have anything to do with extremists," the mayor said of tomorrow’s assembly. The town will be removing garbage cans from the announced route for the march, and the mayor has called on citizens not to park their cars along that route tomorrow.
Activists from the "Let’s Block the Marches!" (Blokujeme!) platform will travel to Duchcov to support the local Romani residents as they have done during all of the previous anti-Romani events there. They will once again display an exhibition about the Roma Holocaust and hold an assembly against neo-Nazism and racism that includes a cultural program.
Right-wing extremists in Plzeň to march from the square past the train station
A march has also been announced in Plzeň, where the event is being called a "March across town to express disagreement". The march will start at Republiky Square and head down Františkánská Street, through the Kopecký Orchards, across the footbridge near the former House of Culture, the turn right on Sirková Street to head for the main train station, then take Železniční Street to Koterovská Street to Gen. Píka Square, and then follow Francouzská Avenue and Slovanská Alej to Milada Horáková Square.
The assembly and march are announced as starting at 13:00 and ending at 20:00. Just as in Ostrava, citizens are preparing to protest against neo-Nazis and racism in Plzeň as well.
Police are recommending that citizens not linger at places along the planned route of the assembly and march or in its immediate vicinity between 13:00 and approximately 20:00. Mayor of Plzeň Martin Baxa told the Czech News Agency that he will personally follow the course of the march and is prepared to disperse it should the Law on Assembly be broken.
According to commentator Mr Houdek, however, the town must be 100 % certain when dispersing an assembly on the spot. "If you disperse it and then a court decides it was unjustified, which has happened in Plzeň twice before, then by law the convener may hold another assembly anywhere during the next 30 days without announcing it to the authorities at all. We won’t know where the next assembly will be and we won’t be able to prepare for it," he explained. The town’s tactic on Saturday will therefore probably be to let the march continue and to just "remove" individuals from it should they break the law.
Organizers say 100 people will attend neo-Nazi protest in České Budějovice
The conveners of the neo-Nazi march in České Budějovice say 100 people will join it. Organizers announced to the town hall that the route will lead from Lannova Avenue to the front of the fairgrounds (Výstaviště), where the event is supposed to end.
Jiří Matzner, spokesperson for the Czech Bohemian Regional Police, told the Czech News Agency that police are preparing for tomorrow afternoon and are ready to respond in case of unrest. He said police are consulting their procedures and the situation with the town hall.
"Naturally we are also following information on social networking sites. That is standard operating procedure," Matzner said.
České Budějovice has been one of the centers of this summer’s anti-Roma protests. Several assemblies and marches have taken place there, mainly on the pretext of the situation at the Máj housing estate.
More than 20 000 people live at the housing estate, which features the largest population of Romani people in the town. The situation there became tense at the end of June, when a dispute between children on a playground was joined by adults.
After that incident, several demonstrations and protest marches followed, resulting in street fighting. Police arrested several dozen people over the course of these events, 10 of whom have been criminally charged. Another eight people have also been charged over the conflict at the playground.
More neo-Nazis than originally expected might make it to tomorrow’s demonstration there. A concert featuring neo-Nazi bands, including a German group, is scheduled to take place near České Budějovice that same day.
Organizers are keeping the location of the concert secret. However, it is clear that right-wing extremists from Germany and perhaps from Poland will be there.
The event is entitled "Bootboys are back 3" and is supposed to be a concert by three "non-political" bands together with bands that espouse neo-Nazism or whose musicians have neo-Nazi pasts. For example, the Czech band Lucky Bonehead Crew will perform there with singer Martin Píša.
"[Píša] is known in the neo-Nazi environment as Jakob68 and has long been an active promoter of White Power concerts, which he collaborated on with people around the Czech branch of Combat 18 (a worldwide neo-Nazi organization). The bass guitar player, the drummer, and the guitarist are from the neo-Nazi band Nomisterion, which performed at a concert in Žatec that was dispersed by police in 2009," Lukáš Jelínek of Antifa.cz told news server iDNES.cz.
Neo-Nazis will try to provoke violence in Jíčín
A neo-Nazi march has also been announced for tomorrow in Jičín. Organizers say it will take place from 15:00 until 18:00 and should head from Husova Avenue to Valdštejnovo Square.
The conveners originally wanted to start at 13:00 but had to wait until 15:00 because of the regular Saturday market being held at that location. The Jičín town hall as well as the municipal and state police are preparing for the right-wing radicals’ assembly.
The convener of the march, who is from the DSSS, says between 100 and 300 people will attend the assembly. "We are monitoring this event and evaluating all of the information we receive about it," Hana Klečalová, spokesperson for the Jičín Municipal Police, told the Czech News Agency.
Klečalová said the police are prepared to do everything necessary to ensure public order and to protect citizens’ health and property. The convener of the event in Jičín has called it an "Assembly against gypsy execution terror and police brutality."
The town hall has said it does not understand why the conveners of the march chose Jičín. "This town doesn’t even have an excluded locality. We have long been resolving any problems through social services directly in the field," Vice-Mayor Petr Hamáček told the Czech News Agency, adding that he disagrees with the event but does not believe the town has the legal option of banning it.
Marches elsewhere: Neo-Nazi delusions, or reality?
Various invitations to other assemblies in other towns are making the rounds on the internet. Of course, the question is whether these aren’t just provocations with no basis in reality.
For example, neo-Nazis could be undertaking an anti-Roma march in Brno tomorrow as well. No such action has been officially announced to authorities, but the internet is full of such information.
According to an event posted through the Facebook social networking site, the neo-Nazis intend to meet up at 15:00 in the park near Koliště Street. The right-wing radicals want to express their disagreement with "black racism" and police violence. The Facebook event lists the march route as passing down Cejl Street, Vranovská Street, Merhautova Street and Milada Horáková Street, ending up back at Koliště Street.
The Děčín edition of the Deník daily paper has reported on the possibility of assemblies in Děčín and Varnsdorf, giving its coverage of the issue the motivational headline "To the streets! People are going to protest against welfare" ("Do ulic! Lidé jdou protestovat proti dávkám"). Should a larger assembly take place in either of those two towns, it will be precisely thanks to the free advertising by this paper.
The Ústí edition of the Deník daily paper is also reporting the possibility of an assembly in Ústí nad Labem, based on unverified information published on Facebook. An invitation to an event in Písek is also being circulated online.
"I don’t have any information at this time [about other events], it’s five towns in five regional areas," police spokesperson Ivana Ježková said when asked about the possibility of unannounced demonstrations. Neo-Nazi assemblies are also rumored to be happening tomorrow in Albrechtice, Příbram, and Vrbno pod Pradědem, but that may just be wishful thinking. The DSSS will be holding electoral rallies in Albrechtice and Vrbno pod Pradědem.
