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Czech Judge Wants Immunity Suspended for Parliamentarian

August 27, 1996
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A district court judge in Czechoslovakia has asked that the immunity of Josef Krejsa, who won a seat in the Czech Parliament, be suspended.

The move last week comes after legal proceedings against Krejsa, who is accused of assaulting people at a 1994 Czech-German commemoration at the Theresienstadt ghetto, were halted.

Krejsa, who won his Parliament seat in June, is a member of the far-right Association for the Republic-Republican Party of Czechoslovakia.

All Parliament members here have immunity.

Police charged Krejsa with disorderly conduct after an incident that took place outside the walls of the town of Theresienstadt, which is called Terezin in Czech.

Theresienstadt served as a ghetto between 1941 and 1945, to which about 150,000 Jews, mainly from Central and Western Europe, were deported by the Nazis. Deportees were sent to various death camps in Europe until October 1942, when they began to be sent exclusively to Auschwitz.

Five of Krejsa’s companions have been found guilty of disorderly conduct and fined between $75 and $300 each.

One of these men, Lubomir Votava, is now on trial here after being accused of assaulting a television cameraman during a Republican Party rally in October 1994.

Jaroslav Svoboda, the district court judge who requested that Krejsa’s parliamentary immunity be waived, said the verdict in the Votava trial might have bearing on Krejsa’s case.

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