Police are currently investigating the racist attack that allegedly targeted Czech Television editor Richard Samek during a protest against the government and public broadcaster Czech Television last week.
During the protests, one of the participants called Czech TV’s journalist a “gypsy bastard”. The participant who verbally attacked the journalist was a candidate for the Freedom and Direct Democracy Party (ID affiliated) in this year’s municipal elections, server Romea, the Czech Romani news server, reported.
“Criminal investigators are already looking into the case of this verbal attack on a Czech Television editor and are investigating the matter,” the police announced.
Samek is not the only Czech journalist who faced aggression on Thursday when the country celebrated its 33 years anniversary of the Velvet revolution – the peaceful protest that ended communist rule in the country. Radek Bartoníček, a journalist from EURACTIV.cz’s media partner, Aktuálně.cz, was also attacked.
“During the demonstration on 17 November, I was only mapping the overall events, doing interviews and filming the crowd in front of me. At those moments, some individuals tried to get me to move away from the front of the crowd, even though I was not preventing anyone from moving. One of them knocked down my mobile phone, which I was using to film,” said Bartoníček.
The Czech police are also looking into the incident.
(Aneta Zachová | EURACTIV.cz)
Source: euractiv.com
