Prague Pride organisers expect 7,000 to attend parade

Prague, Aug 9 (CTK) - The organisers expect some 7000 people to take part in the Saturday march of homosexuals as a culmination of the five-day Prague Pride festival, Czeslaw Walek, head of the Prague Pride association organising the festival, told reporters yesterday.

The march will be staged in Prague for the first time.

The festival will offer 78 events, including sport competitions, exhibitions, theatre performances and film screenings, guided city tours, a workshop for employers focused on gender diversity and a steamboat cruise, along with special programmes for children and the elderly.

Petr Hajek, deputy head of the Presidential Office, has sharply criticised the march. Other representatives of conservative circles have joined the criticism.

Walek said such opinions are marginal.

"Czech society is traditionally tolerant. It only does not elect tolerant representatives sometimes," film director Radim Spacek told reporters.

According to the organisers, Prague Pride is an apolitical cultural festival without any ideological agenda.

The organisers only cancelled the "party of the nude" scheduled for Wednesday for safety reasons since the police pointed to a high risk of conflicts during the event.

Over the festival, the Prague police will reinforce patrols in the streets as from Wednesday.

However, the police do not plan any extraordinary security measures for the Saturday march since they do not expect any brawls and breach of the peace, police spokeswoman Eva Kropacova told CTK yesterday.

Hajek wrote that the homosexual march is a pressure action and a political demonstration of a world with deformed values, and he also called homosexuals "deviant fellow citizens."

He sharply criticised Prague Mayor Bohuslav Svoboda (senior government Civic Democratic Party, ODS) for having officially supported the planned homosexual event.

President Vaclav Klaus backed up Hajek. Klaus said the event should not be held under the auspices of the Prague mayor.

The carnival is not a manifestation of homosexuality but "homosexual-ism", Klaus wrote, adding he considers the word deviation neutral.

However, the festival organisers point out that the society perceives the word negatively, which can provoke dangerous reactions.

On the contrary, the embassies of thirteen countries seated in Prague, including Britain, Canada, Germany, Spain and the United States, supported the Prague Pride homosexual carnival.

Klaus called the embassies' letter "an unprecedented step" and an interference in an internal political discussion.

Foreign Affairs Minister Karel Schwarzenberg (TOP 09) called the letter counter-productive and useless.

Some Czech politicians supported the march.

The Prague Pride march starts on Republic square in Prague centre at 12:00 on Saturday and it will be heading for the Strelecky island where a concert is to be staged in the evening.

A market will also take place on the island where homosexuals' organisations as well as other NGOs will present their work.

As a counterweight to the homosexual carnival, the Young Christian Democrats association will stage a march for the traditional family in Prague centre on Saturday. It is held in cooperation with the Christian Democratic Party (KDU-CSL) and the Movement for Life fighting against abortion. The D.O.S.T. conservative group will also take part in it.