Czech Republic

Czech Interior Ministry says Prague municipality had no way to ban ultra-right activist's event in a public space

5.9.2016 16:13 The Czech Interior Ministry has agreed with a local municipality of Prague regarding its response to a recent event convened in public by the Martin Konvička Initiative (IMK). The ministry found that while there were no legal reasons to ban the event, the announced demonstration should have drawn the attention of the local authority.  full story

Czech Vice PM to visit former concentration camp for Roma, allegedly wants to find money to move pig farm

5.9.2016 14:54 The Czech News Agency reports that Czech Vice Prime Minister Andrej Babiš (ANO) has told the wire service he will visit the location in the town of Lety u Písku where a concentration camp for Roma was formerly situated. The Vice PM wants to raise money to complete the construction of the memorial there and arrange for the pig farm now on the site of the former camp to be bought.  full story

Czech PM says his Vice PM is "leeching off of" anti-Romani sentiment and crossed the line into Nazism

3.9.2016 14:32 Yesterday Czech Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka (Czech Social Democratic Party - ČSSD) said that his Vice PM and Finance Minister, Andrej Babiš, who heads the ANO movement, has decided to "politically leech off of" the Czech Republic's problems regarding coexistence between non-Romani and Romani people prior to the upcoming elections. Sobotka's statement was a response to remarks made by Babiš about the WWII-era concentration camp at Lety by Písek where Romani people perished and from
which they were sent to Auschwitz.  full story

Czech Republic: Man who fired weapon near Romani summer camp apologizes

3.9.2016 10:55 "I didn't want the children or Ms Ida Kelarová to be affected. I would like to deeply apologize for my words, I overdid it. The situation was an exacerbated one, problems with noise from those accommodated at that camp have been happening for years," Martin Kout, the man who threatened Romani children from Kelarová's Čhavorenge choir at a camp gathering in the town of Jiřetín pod Jedlovou, has told news server Romea.cz.  full story

Czech Gov't human rights report: Forcibly sterilized women remain uncompensated

3.9.2016 10:05 The recently-published Report on the State of Human Rights in the Czech Republic for 2015 provides an overview of key topics and measures taken last year in the context of the human rights agenda. The Government report points out the main problems in the country and related issues.  full story

Amnesty International: How are the Czech schools educating Romani children?

3.9.2016 8:20 Amnesty International Czech Republic issued the following press release on 1 September to mark the start of the new school year:  full story

Karel Holomek: Merkel vs. Putin? Outrageous

2.9.2016 7:30 I frequently marvel at the values that are apparently held by a rather large number of people in the Czech Republic who make clear their hatreds and low instincts by protesting against God only knows whom (or why). I was most recently convinced of what those values are during German Chancellor Merkel's visit here.  full story

Analysis: When the Czech Police contribute to disseminating hatred toward Romani people

1.9.2016 17:38 Whoever publicly incites hatred of a nation, race, ethnic group, religion, class or other group of person, or incites the restriction of the rights and freedoms of the members of such a group, is supposed to be punished in the Czech Republic by up to two years in prison. That is the wording of the Criminal Code (Section 356), which also authorizes the same punishment in cases of rioting or conspiring to commit the offense of incitement to hatred.  full story

Czech Republic: Roma commemorate 73rd anniversary of prisoner transport from Hodonín u Kunštátu to Auschwitz

31.8.2016 13:52 The weekend of 20 August saw two important anniversaries in the Czech Republic. One was the anniversary of the 1968 occupation of Czechoslovakia by the Soviet Army.

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Czech Police investigating shots fired at Romani summer camp and local police procedure

30.8.2016 19:00 Yesterday news server Romea.cz published an interview in which we reported on an incident of a man who fired warning shots and shouted verbal abuse at Romani children participating in a summer camp with the Čhavorenge choir in the Děčín area. Regional Police are now investigating.  full story

Czech-language hoaxes deceive online with footage from feature films and news reports

29.8.2016 12:25 A Czech-language hoax published by the Facebook page called "Evropa – Evropanům" (Europe for Europeans) was shared by 10 000 people over the course of just 23 hours on 25 August. The hoax used video footage of a brutal clash between riot police and young men and misinformed the public that it depicted an "Islamic invasion".  full story

Ida Kelarová on warning shots fired near Roma children at music camp: The Czech Police refused to help us

29.8.2016 10:46 Q: During this year's "Romano Drom" music camp for Romani children, eyewitnesses say they experienced attacks that involved "warning shots" being fired. Would you
describe precisely what happened to us?  full story

Czech court says police not responsible for death of Romani man

25.8.2016 7:37 A court in Sokolov, Czech Republic, has acquitted the police officers who arrested a Romani man, Ľudovít Kašpar, in 2012, who subsequently died. The verdict will not be appealed.  full story

Czech study finds publication for teachers defended status quo and opposed inclusion

20.8.2016 10:53 The EDUin organization has published a study by researcher Dušan Klapko from Masaryk University in Brno about the discourse used by the publication "Teachers News" (Učitelské noviny) when discussing the issue of inclusive education. The study finds that from 2010-2014, that publication defended the interests of the "practical" schools and opposed inclusion.  full story

Renata Berkyová: Gays, hands off the Romani flag!

19.8.2016 17:09 What some Romani people are posting on social networks these days about the topic of sexual orientation has prompted me to respond. The springboard for these heated
debates is the fact that Prague Pride, the parade celebrating people of various sexual orientations, included Romani people this year who proudly raised the Roma flag.  full story

Is Czech folk singer's new song racism or social commentary?

19.8.2016 10:05 Is the Czech folk singer Jaromír Nohavica continuing his previous racism, or is his most recent song actually an apt criticism of society? It's very difficult to unequivocally tell, but Nohavica's previous seriously-intended anti-Romani song should be a warning.  full story

Commentary: Czech Social Democrats compete with ultra-right to see who can be more racist and xenophobic

19.8.2016 8:24 Czech MP Stanislav Huml of the Social Democrats, who is infamous for his extreme positions against Islam or refugees, as well as for his conspiracy theories about 9/11, recently published a video on his Facebook profile denying the Holocaust. He called it "brutal, [politically] incorrect, but inspiring".  full story

Czech Constitutional Court to review town's forced relocation of Romani residents

17.8.2016 12:14 The almost decade-long dispute between the Czech town of Vsetín and the Romani residents whom the town evicted and then forcibly relocated into villages entirely outside of the Zlín Region will now be reviewed by the Czech Constitutional Court. The town of Vsetín has filed a constitutional complaint in the matter.  full story

Czech town rejects ombudsperson's critique, says it did not discriminate against and segregate Romani pupils

16.8.2016 18:51 The Czech town of Krásná Lípa is rejecting criticism from the ombudsperson over the way a "Romani" class has been established at the local primary school. The Public Defender of Rights (ombudsperson) visited the town at the end of May and recommended the local administration take several steps to prevent discrimination in future and reduce the risk that anti-discrimination lawsuits might be filed against it  full story

Czech MP Stanislav Huml shares Holocaust denial video online

16.8.2016 13:21 The weekly Euro in the Czech Republic reports that Stanislav Huml, an MP for the Czech Social Democratic Party, has published a video denying the Holocaust to his Facebook profile. The video, which Huml called "brutal and [politically] incorrect" but "inspiring", is a sort of criticism of the "ethnomasochism" of Western civilization, defined as a feeling of guilt for the historical injustices of colonialism, slavery, etc., including what the video terms the "alleged" Holocaust.  full story