Democracy Digest: Roma Killed by Ukrainian Refugee Confuses Czech Far-Right

And the confusion doesn't stop there. As war, inflation and migration helps to expand competition on the far reaches of the political spectrum, the more established radical-right players are circling the wagons. On Wednesday, the SPD - Czechia's only far-right parliamentary party - signed a memorandum of cooperation with the non-parliamentary Trikolora. The union was sealed, so the pair said, with an eye on next year's regional and Senate elections, as well as the EU vote. But really it illustrates that SPD leader Tomio Okamura, whose party polls at around 10 per cent, is worried about losing support to recently arrived upstarts on the "patriotic" scene, as they like to term it. The half-Japanese Okamura has been wary of engaging with the series of large anti-government protests over the last year, which have helped crowd his chosen part of the political spectrum. The latest of these demonstrations - which feature anti-system and pro-Russian narratives as well as complaints over the cost of living - have pushed former Trikolora member Jindrich Rajchl and his PRO party to the fore. At the same time, former PM Andrej Babis, whose ANO party is the largest in parliament, is also seeking to leech support from among the million or so voters that in 2021 voted for parties that did not make it into parliament. Okamura says the deal with Trikolora will form the base for consolidating the country's "patriotic and conservative" forces. Given the bitter fragmentation that tends to dominate in that neighbourhood, a solid union seems unlikely.

Ranking member Sen. James Risch (R-ID) during a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, USA, 14 September 2021. EPA-EFE/Drew Angerer / POOL US blocks Hungary arms deal; top publishing house...