Neo-Nazis likely to march through Czech Plzen on March 1

A neo-Nazi march will be held on March 1 instead of a banned march scheduled for January 19, the march’s organiser Vaclav Bures told CTK today.

The original march date, January 19, coincided with the 65th anniversary of the first deportation of Jews from Plzen to the concentration camps.

Plzen Mayor Pavel Roedl (senior ruling Civic Democrats, ODS) finally banned the march. However, the regional administrative court decided last Friday that the march was banned unjustly because the criteria for the ban were not met. As a result, Bures could organise a new rally.

Bures has to announce the new march to the authorities one day in advance at the latest.

The route of the march is the same as planned before. The marchers are to pass by Plzen’s Great Synagogue.

Bures said he did not know how many people could take part in the event.

Later in January it turned out that Bures was a member of the ODS branch in Plzen-Lochotin. The branch immediately expelled him from the party.

Bures announced the January 19 march as a march in support of the freedom of speech, in reaction to the police intervention that prevented a neo-Nazi march through the historical Jewish Quarter in Prague.