THOUSANDS PROTEST RADAR BASE IN PRAGUE:

Thousands of people gathered today near the building of the Czech Foreign Ministry and on a square near the famous Prague Castle to protest both the visit by US President George Bush and the reason that he is coming- to discuss the construction of an US radar base in the Brdy military area southwest of Prague. This radar apparatus is ostensibly to track missiles from "rogue states", but it has given great offense to the Russians who see its construction and the linked construction of an anti-missile base in Poland as aimed at them rather than any presumed "rogue state". The Russians have responded by saying that they have a "new missile" that can circumvent the anti-missile defences that the USA plans. Whether this is true or not is really a matter of personal choice. They have, however, also stated that they plan to have their missiles targeted on any component of the new missile defense system in eastern Europe, a much more serious threat that has led to large public opposition to the construction of such bases in eastern Europe.

The demonstrators held a mock trial of how Bush would be tried for war crimes after an anarchist revolution. To read more on this go to this a-infos report.

For those of Molly's readers who can read French there is an interesting article on a recent fact finding visit to eastern Europe by representatives of the International Relations Committee of the International of Anarchist Federations. They report on the state of anarchism in three countries, the Czech Republic, Belarus and Bulgaria. The report is not triumphalist, a fault that is all too common amongst certain "anarchists". It lays out both realistic numbers and the difficulties of the people in these three countries while still reporting their success. See the above article for more details.