Dear Comrades and Friends,

Bellow please find a letter by the Communist Youth Union, Czech Republic KSM send to SolidNet asking for solidarity in view of a new process on 19 March against the organization.

Heaving in mind the new appeal by KSM as well as the numerous protest and solidarity actions with KSM in the previous period, the more than 10.000 signatures collected on http://4ksm.kke.gr  we think there is a need to express once more massive opposition against the new attacks targeting not only KSM but very basic rights and liberties.

 
You may forward your protest letters to the following addresses in the Czech Republic:

 
Mr. Vaclav Klaus

President of the Czech Republic

The Office of the President of CR

Prague Castle

11908 Prague

Czech Republic

Fax: ++ 420 224 373 300

Mr. Ing. Miloslav Vlcek

Chairperson Parliament of the Czech Republic

Chamber of Deputies

Snemovi 4

11826 Praha 1

Czech Republic

vlcek@psp.cz

Ministry of Interior

Department of Elections and Associations

Ref :VS-6590/SDR/1-2006

14021 Praha

namesti Hrdinu 3

Czech Republic

Please send a copy to:

Radim Gonda

Vice-chairman of KSM, in charge of international relations

gonda@azit.cz

info@solidnet.org

Thank you for your support

The SolidNet Team

Prague, March 10th, 2008

Dear comrades and friends,

We want to inform you that on March 19, 2008 at 9:00 in Hybernska street 18 (1^st floor) in Prague a trial that shall decide on the legal or illegal status of the Communist Youth Union (KSM) which was banned by the decision of the Ministry of Interior of the Czech Republic in October 2006 will start one year and six months after the KSM filed an action against the decision of the Ministry of Interior and only 3 days before the 8^th Congress of the Communist Youth Union (KSM) which shall take place on March 22, 2008 in Prague. Was it a coincidence that the Ministry of Interior started this process of illegalization of the KSM just few days after the previous 7^th Congress of this political organization of young people and the trial starts 3 days before the forthcoming congress of the KSM?

The attack of the Ministry of Interior against the legal existence of the KSM started in November 2005 under a pretext that the goals of the KSM´s activity interfere with an area reserved to activities of political parties that was, according to the interpretation of the Ministry of Interior of the Czech Republic, excluded from the intervention and activities of civic associations. This argument was completely baseless because according to the Czech legal system the exclusive area of the political parties is defined just as a participation in the parliamentary elections. The KSM did not participate in the parliamentary elections.

The second line of attack of the Ministry of Interior targeted openly the Marxist character of the KSM. The Ministry of Interior tried to coerce the KSM to renounce its political program, communist identity, goals, and theoretical basis in Marx, Engels and Lenin, that is Marxism as a whole.

During a following debate between the KSM and the Ministry of Interior the Ministry dropped all its originally used arguments and in its final decision on the banning of the KSM at the end of 2006 the Ministry used another argument: a programmatic goal of the KSM to replace private ownership of means of production with a collective ownership of means of production.

The KSM resolutely rejected the anticommunist and antidemocratic policy and measures of the Czech state power, organized a large information campaign in the Czech Republic and abroad, filed an action against the decision of the Ministry and intensified its public activities. In this critical period the KSM has launched among other activities a very successful campaign against a plan to construct a US military base in the Czech Republic (the KSM´s petition which is the biggest of the petitions against the US military base has been signed by 150 000 of inhabitants), the KSM developed its struggle against anticommunism, its struggle in defence of the free education for all (now again threatened with another plan to introduce fees for university studies) and started public activities against a disastrous social and economic policies of the current right wing government.

Dear comrades and friends,

We would like to ask you kindly for you attention to the serious development in the Czech Republic where anticommunism and violations of fundamental democratic rights are a part of the state policy.

Comradely yours,

Radim Gonda

Vice-chairman of the KSM responsible for international relations