What's your own situation at the moment?
The Charter has described my situation in its letter of 12 December to Mr Strougal (President of the National Assembly) That Is that my fat is under round the clock surveillance by the police, VB (uniformed police) ageats are watching me and look at the identity papers of those who come to visit me and often prevent people from coming in, especially if they are from outside Prague, This is what happened last Sunday to my father-in-law (Jan Sabata, a party official in 1968, sacked and imprisoned after the Prague Spring) who had come to visit my wife, his daughter, They also prevent people who are on the list from entering, and do not allow any more people in once there are three people hete.
Who is on the list?
Some friends of mine such as Julius Tomit. Vaclay Benda, Vavrinec Korcis, the Rum Various. Mainly people who have been my acquaintances for a long time, in situations which the police regard as suspicious. For example, "Tive o"clock teas at which 10 to 15 people were present. At two of these "teas" there have been as many as 25 people present, in the first case for a lecture and the other time at my birthday.
In the first month - I started keeping count on 27 September after the first search — 70 people of all kinds came to see us; altogether perhaps 120 to 140 people have come.
It annoys them that so many people have come in, so they invent all kinds of limitations which are illegal and contrary to the penal code, but 1 am not in a position to compiain against these practices.
Have you reacted to what the authorities have been doing to you?
01 courses nave milea to procurator General Fejes, whose only reply has been a form letter telling me that the matter will be looked inte When did you send the letter?
A week later 1 wrote another letter and I have just complained to Zbynek Kieswetto, the chief military procurator, because one of his VB agents had committed a theft which is punishable by law, In the corridor outside our fat this guy Jostled the son of my friend Julius Tomin, a boy of 14, and tore pages out of his hands including some of his father's personal correspondence. The police gave it back two SUITS LILI Apart from this I have not done anything. 1 do not think that there has been sufficient reason.
At the moment Dr Kriegel and the Charter are taking up my defence. Perhaps this will bring results I don't know. I've been subjected to many repressive methods sance January 1977 (the launching of Charter 77), and they have continued to get worse.
1 have lost my driving licence, my rank in the army has been withdrawn, the telephone has been cut off, I have had problems at work, and recently 1 got a letter sacking me, which you must have.
Thave got it.
So you know already.
Have you asked your guards why they are keeping you under surveillance?
Yes, often. They Just invoke some order stating that it is necessary to take my protest to the commissariat in Peace Square.
Fellow citizens and friends have cried it and have been told that this is a simple administrative measure from their point of view, and that they have received an order from the Ministry ofthe Interior and it's all in the hands of some unknown "operative' (security agent) whom no-one knows and no-one call contact.
Leaving aside sour personai situation, what is Taken as a whole, good, The Charter has become more active again, there are three spokespeople again, new people are signing and even giving their names publicly, there is a multitude of activities, and, very slowly, the barrier of fear is lifting.
For me, as a revolutionary Marxist, the CICE the Transitional Programme of the Fourth International. It contains demands which, in the context of tbe prescot system, are parily realisable and partly unrealisable. They are demands which get people moving.
It is true that there are tew demands concerning the workers, the working class strictly defined, but there are very few "workers' in the narrow meaning of the word.
Nevertheless the Charler refers to two of the Charter 77 human rights manifesto in Czechosubject to continual persecution. convictions international pacts which our country has signed, and also contains prescripcions which concern the workers, and which have to be Although you say that the actinity of the Charter has expanded, we are receiving less news than we did at the beginning.
Thar's possible, fewer numbered documents are being issued; there have only been two recently, numbers 13 and 14. Have you heard about number 13?
Yes. It's about pop music.
That's right. This is very important for us because young people are interested in this. There in a pressing, and often elementary need for cultural life.
Also, as far as 1 know, another document has been published containing abour 80 new signatures. That doesn't seem very many, but one has to bear in mind the repression which comes down on each signatory.
It is also important that most of the signatories are young and are often manual workers, This I find very positive:
Also there is intense activity around bolding meetings. At the start this was called the anti-university. NOw we use a more modest name; it's simply a question of lecture courses in philosophy or other apbetes which take place in Prague and Broo.
The Charter has also been successful in taking up the case of P. Landavsky who has been released from prison, and also that of Jarda Hutka, who still suffers persecution, but, it seems to me, of a less severe character than previously.
All this activity has been concretely expressed around the Ornest trial. The manner le which it was carried out, the fact that the verdict was fairly moderate, pernaps has something to do with the accivity of the Charter.
Do you think that the authorities are showing sigus of a certain tolerance towards the Charter, or perbaps one should showing more intelligence in their choice of methods in combatting it?
1am, of course, very critical of the way the authorities have been behaving, but I must say with satisfaction that che Charter has, all in all, becoite legal.
Both when I and other people have been interrogared we have been told, 'good, the Charler is okay, no-one can take legal action against you for that, that's quite legal, bur there's something eise...." And they try to establish tbe existence of certain political contacts, of political activity so-called, outside the Charter: proceed in this roundabout way. Except for certain situations where it preseots certain temporary problems, it is not possible to take legal action against someone who supports the Charter, who types out its documents and distributes them.
There is still a reluctance to do these things openly because cases of persecution, such as mine, tre known; they took two typewriters from me, and nothing further has come of that, nor, I am convinoed, will they attack me on that basis, It wasn't so clear at the beginning. Before Vaclac Havel fone of the first Charter spokespoople) was released we thought that he was under attack explicitly for his Charter activity, But we found out afterwards that this Sometimes there have been rumours going around that there was a group within the Churter which was planning terrorist aetions. Evidently this is an attempt to discredit the Charter...
That is quite possible. The police have dreamed up this group and these people. L don't bave information about this. But there have been interrogations about It.
Yes, but it hasn't been stated during the interrogations. According to the records, two questions on this subject bave been put to six people during Interrogations. Have they heard anything about kidnapping or ather outrages, and should they answer yes, are bey aware that they must denounce such acts?
Outside of the records, verbally, my name has been mentioned. Bur when 1 asked my 'friend' Jarda Basta (a policeman) if he and his mates were trying to establish a connection between me and this business, he said no, it had been badly expressed and so on.
All in all this particular police action was very half-hearted, only affected sis people and only lasted a month, Just before it started Dejmal and myself were beid for between 25 and 30 bours, my Nat was searcbed at the end of Sepiember, and after the search there was confusion among the Charter concerning these rumours of terrorism.
It was put about that the police suspected us. It wasn't the case, and i dou't think it had any basis, but people were seized with a sort of panic.
It is false that the police had said to anyone that they had my flat bugsed, that they hau a recording saying that 1 was in contact with West German terrorists and was trying to get hold of arms. All this is untrue.
Unfortunately people living in atmosphere of fear sometimes begin to imagine things and start rumours, some of which even ger as far as Vienna..
You have expressed support for the Fourth International. Recently you sent a protest letter against the Berufsverbot in West Germany. Do sou see say difference between your situation and that of a sinte really menaced by terrorism, the Berufsserbot might have quite a different character?
I signed a collective letter with six people. I don't want to get into an argument, but i do not think that the Herufsterbor is directed against terrorists Of course not. But there are certainly people who work in the police or the cill and public services who defend principles which are opposed to those on which the stule is based. To he more concrete: It is difficult to employ people in the police force who are is farour of the destruction ef the system.
I'm sure it is. In aoy case I am not a supporter of the West Germany police. But l agree with you. However, according to what 1 have heard oue has to raise certain objections Gc/bot. Especially with regard to teaching. My friends who have been atfected by this measure are essentially teachers. In this sense I have protested.
Don't you think that in stressing so strongly the principles of the Fourti International and It Influence, you have reduced the effectiveness of the Charter in the eyes of western public opinion"
When I refer to the Fourth International -as an ideological current, but not on the organisational level — this is not for tactical CINDES Is a matter of conviction, and as a communist 1 tbink that in all circumstances one must say what one thinks, and defend publicly one's principles if only so that no-ope can be deceived in the future.
My activics and the public defence of my opinions simply GETTISHER that the principles of the Charter and those on which the Fourth International are based are in agreement.
about 'a dalek in blue conversing with SOCIALIST CHALLENGE, 2 March 1978 pago 14
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PETR UHL is one of the most prominent advocates slovakia - for which he has lost his job and been This interview was carried out over the telephone by an Austrian journalist sympathetic to the Austrian Socialist Party. Petr Uhl gives his views on the state of the Charter, police repression and his own political