Czech Interior Ministry underestimated extremism - Komorous

The situation is different now as the current Interior Ministry headed by Martin Pecina considers the fight against extremism one of its priorities, Komorous added.

Komorus said the former ministry management did not solve "the fundamental things that threaten the principles of a democratic state functioning."

Pecina said last year when he assumed office that the fight with extremism would be one of his priorities.

He then appointed Komorous, former chief of the National Anti-drug Centre (NPC), head of the Interior Ministry's new anti-extremism group.

Since then the police have carried out several crackdowns on ultra-right radicals and have arrested a number of them.

The Interior Ministry has also worked out a second proposal for the abolition of the extremist Workers´Party (DS) that is linked to neo-Nazis, according to experts.

The Supreme Administrative Court started dealing with the case last week, but it adjourned the proceedings on January 14. It will probably issue the verdict in February.

The court turned down the first proposal for the DS´s dissolution submitted by the previous coalition government of Mirek Topolanek (Civic Democrats, ODS) last March over the lack of conclusive evidence.

Many experts then criticised the Interior Ministry, headed by Pecina´s predecessor Ivan Langer (ODS) then, for having prepared the proposal insufficiently.

Pecina today said he plans to launch a campaign against racism, possibly in June.

The documentary Obfuscatory Democracy directed by Oliver Malina Morgenstern, some shots of which were screened today, shows neo-Nazi events organised in the past four years, mainly marches and demonstrations, Morgenstern said.

It reveals "the unbelievable evil and aggression" behind these events, he stressed.

He added he would like his film to be screened at schools.

The documentary will be premiered in Prague´s Svetozor cinema on January 26, on the occasion of the 65th anniversary of the last day of the Auschwitz-Birkenau (Oswiecim-Brzezinka) Nazi concentration camp in Poland that was liberated on January 27, 1945.

The premiere will be held in protest against "mounting extremism and anti-Semitism," the organisers said.

After the screening a debate will be staged with the film-makers, with Prime Minister Jan Fischer, Pecina and Komorous attending.

Autor: ČTK
www.ctk.cz