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Police detained six people at an anti-immigration rally on Prague’s Wenceslas Square on Wednesday night. Around 500 people attended the demonstration with a handful of opponents of the action also in place but kept apart by the police. Speeches were delivered by Tomio Okamura, the former leader of the Dawn Party elected to the lower house at the last elections, and right-wing journalist Adam Bartoš. Some opponents pelted Okamura with eggs but their aim was awry. Calls were made for the Czech Republic to be reserved for Czechs, for the closure of borders, and departure from the EU. Fake gallows were erected for ‘traitors’and calls made for the country to be saved from ‘hordes of horny blacks.’

Tributes quickly poured out for Sir Nicholas Winton on news of his death. Czech president Miloš Zeman said he had always admired Sir Nicholas’ 'personal bravery.' Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka described him as ‘a symbol of courage and deep humanity.’ The Czech ambassador to Britain, Michael Žantovský described him as ‘a positive man who radiated good.’ British prime minister David Cameron said ‘the world had lost a great man.’ Many British papers described Sir Nicholas as ‘the British Schindler’, a reference to Oscar Schindler, although Nicholas Winton himself rejected the comparison and said they had nothing in common.

Sir Nicholas Winton, the Briton who helped save the lives of 669 children by arranging their evacuation from Nazi occupied Czechoslovakia has died at the age of 106, the AP agency announced. Sir Nicholas’ exploit in saving the mostly Jewish children in 1939 were largely unknown until 1988 when it featured on a popular BBC programme. The former stockbroker and businessman remained modest about his achievements nonetheless. He was awarded the Czech Republic’s highest civil honour, the order of the White Lion in 2014. Some of the rescued children later went on to become famous, such as the Canadian journalist Joe Schlesinger, British politician Alf Dubs, and British writer Vera Gissing. The last evacuation train with 250 children left on September 1, 1939, the same day Hitler invaded Poland. The borders closed, those children never made it; they are believed to have all perished in concentration camps.

Applications for asylum in the Czech Republic rose in 2014 to total 1,154 but most of those making demands were from Eastern Europe, overwhelmingly from Ukraine. Applications from European countries accounted for just over 57 percent of the demands, those from Asian countries 31 percent, and African countries just under eight percent. The total number of asylum applications is a fifth of the total made in 2004. With the latest wave of immigration to Europe and a doubling the number of illegal immigrants found on Czech territory this year the number of asylum applications is expected to rise.