Police crackdowns on extremism increasing

The raids point to a growing police crackdown on right-wing extremists. Over the course of 2009 police have made arrests connected with the Czech Republic’s relatively strict anti-fascism laws on nine occasions. Only two incidents involving extremists resulted in arrests in 2008. Most recently police detained 14 individuals in connection with a brutal arson attack on a Roma family last spring, and 26 were arrested in separate incidents during early June. The charge of promoting a movement for the suppression of human rights and hate speech in the Czech Republic can carry up to eight years in prison.