Far-right demonstrators gather in support of man jailed for racially motivated murder; no incidents reported

Around 120 far-right demonstrators gathered in the eastern town of Svitavy on Saturday afternoon for a fourth annual march in support of Vlastimil Pechanec, a member of the skinhead movement sentenced six years ago for a racially motivated murder. Due to heavy rain the protesters called off the march and held a meeting outside the local railway station. Several dozen police officers, including members of riot police, oversaw the gathering but no incidents were reported. Vlastimil Pechanec was sentenced to a 17-year jail sentence in 2003 for murdering a Romany man two years earlier, stabbing him twice in the stomach.