Czech NGO whose head spreads hatred against Muslims and refugees will continue to work with Govt Agency for Social Inclusion

The "Romani" NGO called Lampa will remain a member of the Local Partnership in the town of Ralsko that has been established by the Czech Government Agency for Social Inclusion (ASZ). Members of that Local Partnership made that decision in response to reports by news server Romea.cz that the head of Lampa, Jiří Hanzl, supports the hate group Bloc against Islam and attacks the Government's Hate Free Culture initiative.

"The Local Partnership in Ralsko, which convened on 8 June 2016, addressed the situation regarding the Lampa group, among other things. The meeting was attended by Jiří Hanzl, who is the chair of the group. After extensive discussion regarding Mr Hanzl's controversial remarks, it was decided that Lampa will remain a member of the Local Partnership," ASZ director Radek Jiránek told news server Romea.cz on 25 July.

"None of those present proposed the group be excluded, although several members sharply distanced themselves from those remarks. The Agency for Social Inclusion continues to also distance itself from them, as our work is based on supporting pro-integration policies at local level, and the core of that support should be respect for ethnic, national, religious, sexual and other minorities," the ASZ director told news server Romea.cz.

Work in the Local Partnership is done by representatives of the municipality, the nonprofit sector, the schools, the state administration and other actors who can influence the situation of the socially excluded or those at risk of social exclusion in a particular place. Members of the Local Partnership in Ralsko discussed whether to collaborate further with Lampa after discovering that the Národní listy ("National Paper") publication had published a photo of the couple who lead Lampa with the following caption:  "Aleš [sic] Hanzl and his wife are BPI [Bloc against Islam] in Mimoň. We will introduce more BPI members in our next issue during the second half of May."

Hanzl also disseminates hatred against Islam, Muslims and refugees on his Facebook profile. He also attacks the European Union and Czech Human Rights Minister Jiří Dienstbier, who oversees the ASZ.

Hate Free Culture, one of the ASZ's media tools against the dissemination of hatred, prejudice and stereotypes, has also been targeted for attack by Hanzl. He has published anti-Muslim hoaxes on his Facebook profile as well.

Recently, for example, news server Romea.cz reported that a long-refuted hoax about an alleged wedding between 450 little girls and adult men was disseminated online among Romani people through Hanzl's Facebook profile. The disinformation was first spread in 2009 as alleged proof of alleged pedophilia among Muslims.

In May, news server Romea.cz published an article by Saša Uhlová about the connections between Hanzl and the hate group Bloc against Islam, after which Hanzl began indiscriminately attacking both the author and Romea.cz. "Saša Uhlová - this left-wing journalist is obsessed with the dissemination of articles that are false and hateful and is willing to write anything for money. She is an external reporter for the totalitarian news server Romea.cz, which has nothing to do with democratic values and just exploits Romani people to disseminate left-wing extremism," Hanzl wrote in June 2016.