"Final Solution" author sentenced

A former leader of an ultra-nationalist political party has received a suspended sentence for publishing a book that suggested all Roma be deported to India.

The District Court in Písek sentenced Jiří Gaudin to a 14-month jail sentence, suspended for two years, meaning he is unlikely to actually serve time unless he breaks the law again. Gaudin faced a maximum of three years in prison for inciting racial hatred.

The so-called study was launched last April. Gaudin and around 20 members and supporters of the now-dissolved National Party (NS) staged the event at Lety, the former site of a Nazi concentration camp for Roma during World War II.

At the event, an imitation road sign was erected pointing to "Gypsies" in one direction and "pigs" in another, alluding to a pig farm that currently operates on the former camp site.

Gaudin is the only listed author of the publication titled The Final Solution to the Gypsy Question, which court experts said was a reference to the Nazi plan to murder European Jews.

František Kostlán, editor of Roma news site Romea.cz, told The Prague Post the swift handling of the case by the courts "shows that our society condemns his action."

Kostlán said he believed the length of the sentence given for the crime was a matter for the court, but added that it was important the Czech Republic dissociate itself from these ideas.

"His book explicitly followed on the Nazis' solution of the Jewish issue," Kostlán said. "It is important, therefore, that our state clearly distance itself from it."

The book advocates the relocation of all Roma to India, with costs paid for by the Czech state by the elimination of social welfare payments for Roma. It suggests offering India financial compensation for the relocation.

The text was adopted as official NS party material last year. Speaking at the time, Gaudin told the Czech News Agency the publication was a solid piece of work: "This is not a provocation. It's a serious scholarly work including contributions from experts who are currently publishing."

The other experts' names are not listed in the publication, which Gaudin said was because they did not want to encounter problems in their other work as a result of their participation in the project.

It was not the first time the NS was embroiled in criminal proceedings. In March of this year, Pavel Sedláček was given a one-year suspended jail sentence for racist and xenophobic remarks in a speech at a National Party gathering on Wenceslas Square in October 2008.

In November 2009, members of the National Party received suspended sentences over the content of the party's television advertisement during the European parliamentary election campaign.

The video clip featured the phrase "The Final Solution to the Gypsy Question" and alternated footage of Roma children and families with slogans such as "Stop Black Racism," "No Favoritism for Gypsies" and "We Don't Want Black Racists Among Us."

Gaudin also made the headlines in September 2009, when he and seven others gathered outside a Brno mosque to distribute leaflets protesting against the construction of a new mosque in the city.

Munib Hasan, a spokesman for the Brno Muslim community, told The Prague Post after the incident he believed the demonstration was a pre-election publicity stunt, adding there was no significant opposition to Muslims expanding from their 11-year-old facility.

The extreme-right party first entered the Czech political scene in 2002, agitating against the European Union and immigrants for several years.

The organization fell apart last autumn. In October 2009, party Chairwoman Petra Edelmannová resigned, and within two months all other members of the party leadership council also resigned.

- Klára Jiřičná contributed to this report.

Bill Lehane can be reached at
blehane@praguepost.com