For weeks there have been riots between Czech locals and newly settled Roma in northern Bohemia. What started as a series of brutal but isolated fights has grown into a popular movement in small towns along the eastern German border. Right-wing extremists have fanned the hatred.
Jindich Nestler wouldn't call himself a racist. "The good gypsies can stay," he says. "But most of them are lazy or criminals or even terrorists. They have to disappear."
Nestler is a 36-year-old official of the far-right "Workers' Party for Social Justice," or DSSS, by its Czech initials. DSSS is a successor party to the neo-Nazi group Dlnická Strana (DS), which was banned a year and a half ago by the highest Czech administrative court. One reason the court gave for the ban was that Dlnická Strana organized rallies that led to pogrom-like riots against the Roma.
For the last several weeks, far-right extremists have been back on the offensive. They're worried -- again -- about the Roma minority in the Czech Republic. In a part of Bohemia called luknovský výbek, near the border with the eastern German state of Saxony, a bitter feud is raging between ethnic Czech locals and several hundred Roma. Interior Minister Jan Kubice has sent a detachment of 250 police to the region to quell any more problems, but he's had to admit that the situation had lurched out of control.
So far, the massive police presence has not calmed things down. One center of violence is Nový Bor. Some 300 neo-Nazis, most of them young men with bald heads and black jackets, marched alone last Saturday through the small town roughly 50 kilometers (31 miles) from the German border. The right-wing extremists chanted "Gypsies must go" and "Free, social and national" -- a phrase also used by members of the right-wing extremist National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD).
"We are the voice of the people," claimed Nestler, the DSSS official. And several hundred locals, in fact, stand by the road to applaud the neo-Nazis.
Around 600 police officers, many in riot gear, tried to keep the situation under control. Some German police also stood at roadblocks on the road to Nový Bor. "We're here to give administrative assistance," one female officer from Saxony said.
By the end of the day, more serious outbursts of violence had been sparked a few kilometers away. Such strong anti-Roma sentiment has generally been associated with other parts of Europe, like Hungary , where for years bloody riots against them have taken place. But the current outbreak started several months ago, when more and more Roma families started moving to luknovský výbek.
Police noticed a sharp uptick in crime -- theft above all -- and at the start of August, several Roma boys armed with machetes attacked a bar in Nový Bor, where a fight had previously broken out between Roma and some other guests. "You white pigs," the young men reportedly hollered; three patrons were injured.
The far-right DSSS likes doesn't mind fanning the fears of ordinary Czechs. Tomá Vandas, who leads the party, likes to sharpen the tone. He's declared Nový Bor the site of a "battle for the future."
Roma representatives, on the other hand, complain of exposure to a constant discrimination which has never been taken seriously by Czech society. Neo-Nazis threw Molotov cocktails at the house of a Roma family in the eastern Czech town of Ostrava, for example. A two-year old girl suffered serious burns.
The Roma in Nový Bor sit in front of a dilapidated barracks on the edge of town. No one wants to talk with journalists. "Please don't take our picture," a young woman says.
A social worker, who doesn't want to be named, points at the house. The living conditions are catastrophic: Some families with two children live in single rooms. "Of course a lot of Roma are criminals," the social worker says. But she can't stand the DSSS. "You lock people in a place like this and you wonder why they have social problems."
Around 250,000 Roma live among 10 million Czechs, and it's no coincidence that more and more of the ethnic minority have come to this part of northern Bohemia. There are 300 similar slums around the country. Several can be found in big-city centers. Real-estate companies pay the Roma -- or offer to forgive their debts -- if they abandon potentially lucrative buildings in city centers and move to remote regions near the German border. The companies even bring them to specific abandoned houses, then charge high rents -- or even claim welfare subsidies directly from the state.
Some homeowners "exploit" the Roma, says Martin imáek, director of a state agency for social integration. Real-estate speculators charge them unprecedented, sky-high rents and excessive rates for water and power, he says. "This leads to unrest and creates problems for coexistence throughout the entire town," imáek told a Czech radio station.
Jirí Moravec won't deny these root causes for the violence. He's the head of the DSSS in Varnsdorf, 20 kilometers north of Nový Bor, right on the German border. "A lazy government and clever real-estate firms have brought us the Roma problem," he admits. "Now we have to take the law into our own hands."
Moravec won't elaborate on just what he means by this, but what he could be alluding to is on display the following Sunday. Dozens of neo-Nazis tried to storm the former Hotel Sport, where Varndorf's Roma live. The ground floor of the collapsed building had been walled shut; heavily armed police secured the surrounding streets. Officers in civilian clothing guarded the door. The extremists didn't seem to mind. They threw stones and firecrackers at the guards. Officials only managed to drive away the DSSS members with firehoses; police said 41 arrests were made.
To enter the Hotel Sport you have to climb into the rear courtyard. A man named Roman sits there. He's 27 and unemployed, like most of the hotel guests. When Roman receives money, he sends a friend to a nearby supermarket for food. "I'm a gypsy, no one would ever give me a job," he says. Even black-market construction work goes to Ukrainian workers before it would go to him, he says. He and his wife and their two kids need to get by on 2,000 koruna per month (about 80 or $112).
He doesn't want to blame all his Czech neighbors wholesale. But he says about half the people in Varnsdorf are racist. "I'm a gypsy," Roman says again. "When it gets to be too much, I just move to another country."
Continued on Page 47
#3
See also CHINESE MILITARY FORUM > POLAND SAYS "WAR IN 10 YEARS".
Debt, Econ-led Crises could lead to possible EU breakup + WAR AMONG EU MEMBER-STATES BY 2020.
versus
* CHINA DAILY FORUM > DANGEROUS CROSSROADS: RUSSIAN MILITARY CHIEF: [Russia + Russian Armed Forces must] PREPARE FOR "WORST-CASE" SCENARIOS IN UNRAVELING WORLD.
* PEOPLE'S DAILY FORUM > CHINA MAY FACE GREATER TERRORIST THREAT THAN US, as due to China's rise + steady US decline.
World is entering a period = decade or more? of "DISORDER".
#1
From the article: From my point of view, the pressure and slaughter inflicted by two world wars on both countries created a collective mental breakdown.
Europe's still crazy after all these years.
#2
IIRC CNBC TV AM > EX-US AMBASSADOR MICHAEL BURNS = argued that, as per the on-going EuroZone Debt Crisis + "Single EU Currency" issue, IHO MAINSTREAM/ORDINARY = "STREET" EUROS ARE IN DE FACTO, PRO-NATIONALIST "PEOPLE'S REVOLT" AGZ THE NEW EU CENTRAL GOVT. IN BRUSSELS.
IIUC, the Euro/EuroZ Common Man does NOT ANY "SINGLE CURRENCY" UNTIL ANY AND ALL IN-DEPTH RESEARCH + ANALYSES HAS BEEN DONE, EXPLANATIONS MADE, STATE-SPECIFIC SOVEREIGNTY + LOCAL QUALITY-OF-LIFE COMPLICATIONS, ETC. SPELLED OUT IN NANO DETAIL.
#1
A little over 200 years ago, French revolutionary forces invade and occupied Switzerland. Other than the intervening civil war, they've had peaceful international relations.
You know what the fellow said in Italy, for thirty years under the Borgias, they had warfare, terror, murder and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and the Renaissance. In Switzerland, they had brotherly love, they had five hundred years of democracy and peace and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock.
Harry Lime [Orson Welles] The Third Man
Not quite accurate, but....
Posted by: Eric Jablow ||
09/16/2011 9:22 Comments ||
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#4
the Borgias, they had warfare, terror, murder and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and the Renaissance. In Switzerland, they had brotherly love,
Heh. At the time the Swiss exported their manpower as mercenaries which were considered among the more professional [least likely to revolt or desert] and efficient killers of their time. The Swiss seldom gave quarter. The last vestige are to be found in the Swiss guard of the Vatican.
#5
Peace has its price. The Swiss have become immoral in their neutrality. Unwilling to help defend the West and yet basically hiding behind the defensive shield provided. Unwilling to fight the Nazi's yet profiting by selling and hiding Nazi gold. Pretty questionable stuff, I wouldn't hold them up as an example to anybody.
#6
Switzerland is neutral and armed, not pacifistic.
When they did the right thing by not tolerating Gaddafi's hellspawn's crimes on their own territory they got zero help from the 'West.'
Switzerland's Schengen 'partners' applied heavy pressure on Switzerland to make them lift the ban on visas for Gaddafi regime elements.
The US government did nothing when Gaddafi regime threatened to storm the Swiss embassy in Tripoli. In fact a US State Department spokesman apologized to Gaddafi for having ridiculed Gaddafi's call for jihad on Switzerland.
Switzerland is representing the US in Iran so a threat to a Swiss embassy should be a concern of the US.
The 'West' has been unwilling to make minimal efforts to defend Switzerland even when under an implicit treaty obligation to do so.
#7
During WW II the Swiss government repeatedly and pointedly told the Germans that they would not surrender --unlike the rest of the Western European countries-- and that they would fight all the way back to the Alps and leave nothing usable in the country, whether factories or fields. They basically told them that they'd rather destroy their own country than be conquered.
But sure, continue to promote your ignorant hatred of Switzerland, a tiny country that was surrounded by the Axis on all sides, and HAD TO F*** TRADE with both sides at war in order to maintain neutrality. Unlike America, Switzerland has for centuries been determined to not get involved in foreign wars; part of that determination is the requirement by other countries that you don't SIDE with either party.
You may want to consider living at peace instead of running a militaristic empire and p**** on all other countries in the world. Destroying the Taliban regime in Afghanistan and Saddam's Baathist regime in Iraq was plenty sufficient; Iran should have been next. Get out of these hellholes, stop sacrificing the young and spirited, just bomb enemies back to the stone age when they commit acts of war, tell them it will be worse next time, and be done with it. After more than 60 years, get out of Japan, Italy, Germany, etc. and let them protect their own peace and freedom. Learn some history. Don't be a self-destructive empire. And understand that America is --today-- in some respect far from being the best in the world.
Posted by: Aware of History ||
09/16/2011 20:15 Comments ||
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#8
And understand that America is --today-- in some respect far from being the best in the world.
And soon the world will find out what happens when America, as imperfect as it may be, is not around to bail it out at its expense.
#9
Mr. History, were you aware that the Nazis put a big, fat, red J on the passports of their Jewish citizens because the Swiss demanded it? That way they could stop such undesireables at the border and send them back. According to family lore a few of my relatives made it in before the cut-off. Others did not.
The other price of Swiss "independence" was the German military trains taking a shortcut through your country from one side of the Nazi empire to the other. My German tutor, who grew up in St. Gallen -- a cousin of mine had been her family doctor there, oddly enough, before she moved to America in disgust at the rest of you -- remembers them keeping her awake many nights...and she resented deeply that none of the grownups ever talked about it.
When your banks give back what they refused to return to the Jews after the war, insted of getting caught over and over again shredding documents, then you might be entitled to own a high horse, let alone climb into the saddle and sneer down your nose from such a great height.
#10
Keep repeating your lies, miss tw. And for your education, I'm not Swiss, as you seem to believe. Swiss banks are so not "my" banks in any meaningful sense. I'm not going to spend time arguing with your misrepresentations, I've seen your anti-Swiss game previously.
While you believe the Swiss people had a happy and pleased life in cahoots with the Nazis and their extermination of Jews EVERYWHERE ELSE in EUROPE, you are watching the True America go down the drain. You're busy hating Switzerland? the only country in Europe that adopted a constitution and form of government actually based on the American Revolution?
As Procopius rightly hints, the end of America will lead to another Dark Age. Think about it. Your hatred of Switzerland is so important to you? You think your false accusations, and your bankrupt government who has extracted MULTIPLE TIMES OVER DECADES gold and money from Swiss companies and their central bank as "reparation" for being neutral during WW II, you think that government somehow still occupies a moral high ground? you think your anti-Swiss creeds do?
I hate what started in the middle of Europe 70+ years ago, and in Russia almost 100 years ago. I know and appreciate that you're at neither point, but I'm sorry to have to despise your obsession with trying to present Switzerland as some sort of Nazi stooge. I love the ideals and achievements of the American Revolution. We should all try to live up to those ideals, and one aspect of it is to practice the virtue of justice -- praise the good, don't propagate lies and hatred of the good.
I guess what I say won't change your mind, but maybe I'll motivate others to study history and focus on praising the good instead of claiming that the good are somehow evil. Meanwhile, let's be clear that your hatred of Switzerland is deeply and entirely unjust.
Posted by: Aware of History ||
09/16/2011 22:43 Comments ||
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#11
God damn swiss, stealing our chocolates
Posted by: Frank G ||
09/16/2011 22:53 Comments ||
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#12
the only country in Europe that adopted a constitution and form of government actually based on the American Revolution?
I must have erred, trusting in America, truth, justice, and Rantburg.
Posted by: Aware of History ||
09/16/2011 23:37 Comments ||
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#14
No, they are an example. An example of what happens when you make safety your priority. It causes you to compromise all of your Christian values. And should you do so, what is left of your soul when you die a safe death?
#16
I don't hate Switzerland, Mr. History, any more than I hate Germany, where I lived quite happily for a number of years. The war was a long time ago, after all, and most of those still alive were children But I don't put the Swiss up on a pedestal, either, not when I have information from eyewitnesses of their fine earthenware feet. Whence your own passion, pray tell, if you have no personal connection? And where did you get your information: reading the Heidi books, fondue dinners with friends, a ski trip? Or are you the child of Swiss emigrants, perhaps, loyal to the old sod, as it were?
Interesting site on the history of SwItzerland here, put up by a gentleman in Lucerne. According to him, my accusations are not so far off.
As for America, we here at Rantburg are doing our various bits to keep it all from sliding into the sea, taking the rest of the world with us.
#18
I abide by facts and history, not anecdotes or invectives. You don't seem to believe that one can seek the former without foul motive or recourse to the latter. That's less than admirable.
And why would my present location matter -- does this piece of information give you a sense of superiority? is it relevant in any way?
Do stay the course, keep denouncing Switzerland and the Swiss people for remaining free from Nazi occupation. Surely all neighbouring people were so superior during WW II. I'll tell that to my relations in Switzerland, none of whom were sent to concentration camps, despite being Jewish. NOT ONE. Should I then try to reach their relatives from Germany, France, Austria, and Italy? how about the ones in the Netherlands? Poland? the rest of Europe? I've not witnessed your kind of anti-Swiss vitriol poured onto such other European nationalities. Is that significant?
Some day you may want to reflect on the consequences of denouncing the good while being immersed in growing evil. I don't quite understand why p**** on Switzerland is a badge of honour for some Americans. It rather reminds me of anti-Americanism in France.
Posted by: Aware of History ||
09/17/2011 0:24 Comments ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
