Czech Republic: DSSS extremists preparing to demonstrate in Varnsdorf again

News server Deník.cz reports that promoters of the Workers Social Justice Party (Dělnická strana sociální spravedlnosti – DSSS), led by party chair Tomáš Vandas, are heading to the town of Varnsdorf once more this fall. They will be doing so almost exactly two years to the day after neo-Nazis and other right-wing extremists repeatedly fomented violence on the streets there.  

The event has been announced for Saturday, 14 September. In the past the party’s public rallies have been the starting point for protest marches on residential hotels with Romani tenants in the town.

The right-wing extremists do not deny that the upcoming assembly in Varnsdorf is linked to the social unrest two years ago. "The main topic of the assembly will be remembering the events of two years ago and evaluating the situation in the Ústí Region," said Vandas, who will be running in upcoming elections there as the party leader.

The party claims that the Moravian-Silesian Region and the Ústí Region are in the most critical situation and that it wants to pay the most attention to the Ústí Region. Vandas also said he is not concerned that the September assembly of "workers" might once more degenerate into a march on residential hotels occupied by Roma.  

"We have merely announced a rally. Whoever decides to hold a march, that will be their responsibility," the party chair claims.  

Almost every time party has held a rally, people have set out on marches with troubled localities as their destination. The last time was in České Budějovice, where police officers have detained as many as 200 people during protests over the course of three weekends and had to deploy tear gas and water cannon.

The mayor of Varnsdorf is also not afraid of possible problems with a march through the town. "At this moment, rather a lot of people have realized there is a need to express their opinion, but that violence is not the way," Mayor Martin Louka is convinced.

Problems with right-wing extremists have recently taken place not only in České Budějovice, but also in the town of Duchcov (Teplice district). During a 22 June rally by the DSSS there which was held to protest an assault on a non-Romani married couple by a group of Romani people, 11 police officers were injured. Police charged three demonstrators with assaulting public officials and rioting and another eight with misdemeanors.

Prior to that incident, police also had to intervene in Duchcov at the end of May against an anti-Romani assembly of several hundred people. After the event  officially ended, about 300 protesters set off toward streets in the Romani part of town.