The Prague City Court rejected an appeal from the Czech Communist Youth Association (KSM) against an official banning order, the German JungeWelT reported on March 27. The interior ministry prohibition order was originally issued in October 2006.
The KSM's crime is to include the "elimination of private ownership of means of production" as part of its program. It also calls for the establishment of a "socialist democracy", which would violate human rights according to the interior ministry and the court.
Responding to the judicial ban, the KSM convened its 8th congress, with over one hundred delegates and guests, under the motto "communists at the frontline of the fight for the rights of the majority of the youth, for peace and socialism!" The congress unanimously condemned the "attacks of state power against young communists".
The KSM promised to increase its activities in the student movement against the threat of tuition fees, and also the fight against a planned US missile base in the Czech Republic. Already 150,000 people have signed a petition against the base's construction.
The next threat of the interior ministry is to appoint a "liquidator" to seize the KSM's property if it continues to operate openly. These manoeuvres are part of a wider campaign targeting the KSM's parent organisation, the Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia (KSCM), which obtained approximately 12% of the vote in the 2006 elections.
Czech politics has been deadlocked since those elections. Eliminating the KSCM parliamentary block would open the way to untrammelled right-wing control.