Opposition Christian-Democratic Movement (KDH) Member of Parliament Vladimir Palko sharply criticized action that Belgian police took against participants in a protest against the "Islamization of Europe" in Brussels on Tuesday. In an open protest letter to the Belgian Ambassador to Slovakia, Alain Cools, Mr. Palko protests the use of force against the peaceful rally. He compared the activities of Brussels City Hall and police to those of Communist organs in Slovakia prior to 1989. During the demonstration for human rights and religious freedom on March 25, 1988 in Bratislava, he experienced that the constitutionally guaranteed freedom of assembly did not exist in practice. "The Communist police also dispersed a quiet demonstration with the use of violence," he said.
Mr. Palko says in his letter that police unjustifiably attacked politicians legitimately elected in free elections: Deputy Speaker of the Flemish Parliament Luk Van Nieuwenhuysen and member of the European Parliament Frank Vanhecke. He underscored that he was able to imagine similar police action against parliamentary deputies only in Lukashenko's Belarus. He added that he does not understand why it is forbidden to demonstrate against the Islamization of Europe in Brussels.
Police arrested two leaders of a Belgian far-right party Tuesday for staging an illegal protest against the "Islamization of Europe," six years to the day after the terrorist attacks on New York and the Pentagon. About 200 protesters faced more than 100 police, who closed off streets around EU headquarters, backed up by water cannons and helicopters.
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