Czech Republic: Commemoration of Romani partisan will plant tree in his honor

A Romani hero of the Czechoslovak resistance during WWII, the partisan Josef Serinek, will be commemorated by an assembly at the end of this month. The event is being organized by the Black Partisan initiative (Černý partyzán), led by former Green Party chair Ondřej Liška, who is currently the country director in the Czech Republic of the Ashoka organization.

The assembly will take place on 30 July 2017 at 14:30 above the village of Spělkov (Vysočina Region), not far from the place where Serinek first found safe haven while engaged in the partisan struggle. Those attending will plant a tree together, which organizers say they want to “commemorate this essential figure of the antifascist resistance and former prisoner of the concentration camp for Romani people at Lety, and to commemorate the men and women of his group and the brave local inhabitants who supported them and worked together with them.”

The tree planting is part of an initiative attempting to create a network of trails commemorating the fates and connecting the places linked with Serinek’s work, that of resistance groups in general, and their supporters in that region. The next phase of the project will aim to make a map of the entire memorial hiking trail available at www.partyzanskastezka.cz.