Activists campaigning for human rights in Belarus claim that by sponsoring the Ice Hockey World Championships due to be held in Belarus in 2014, the Czech car manufacturer will effectively support the authoritarian regime of Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko. On Thursday the activists took their message to Wenceslas Square in Prague where they demonstrated outside Škoda’s Prague office.
“We would like to draw attention to the fact that in Belarus we have political prisoners and that Belarus is an undemocratic, totalitarian regime. This sporting event will legitimize the Belarus authorities and will be used by Lukashenko for propaganda,” Belarus dissident Ales MIkhalevich, who stood as presidential candidate in against Lukashenko in 2010 and has asylum status in the Czech Republic, told the ČTK news agency.
The protestors carried slogans in Czech and English including “Škoda plans to support dictator Lukashenko” and “Freedom for political prisoners”.
“Here sits one of the organizations which belongs to Škoda, a part of the Škoda corporation, and we’re in Prague, in the capital of the Czech Republic where it is easier for us to organize a gathering than in Plzeň or Mladá Boleslav,” Mikhalevich said explaining the choice of venue for the demonstration.
Mikhalevich was apparently unaware that Škoda Auto, based in Mladá Boleslav, has since 1945 been a separate entity from engineering and other industrial concerns located in Plzeň which still carry the Škoda name.
Škoda Auto has been the main sponsor of the International Ice Hockey Federation’s (IIHF) annual World Championships since 1993, and its current sponsorship agreement is valid through to 2017. According to the Guinness Book of Records, it is the longest uninterrupted sponsorship deal in the history of sport.
Sponsorship record-breaker
Škoda Auto quickly issued a statement in reaction to the demonstration. “Through its sponsorship of the Ice Hockey World Championships Škoda by principle does not support specific host countries or their organizations, but the IIHF and its global involvement in ice hockey,” the company’s spokesman, Evžen Krauskopf, said, adding that the World Championships and IIHF education programs would not be possible without the support of sponsors.
In January 2011, the European Parliament passed a motion recommending the EU Foreign Affairs Council to organize a boycott of sporting events in Belarus including the 2014 Ice Hockey World Championships, but the council did not act on the proposal.
Alexander Lukashenko is an avid ice hockey fan and has spent $350 million on the construction of the state-of-the-art 15,000 seater Minsk Arena and, according to the daily Vechernyi Minsk, 450 billion Belarus rubles on the 8,000 seater Chizhovka Arena, also in Minsk, which is due to be completed this year. All the 2014 World Championship games are due to be played at the two new arenas.
Mikhalevich stood as a candidate in the disputed Belarus presidential elections on December 19, 2010. He was arrested the next day after he addressed a mass demonstration in the Belarus capital Minsk following the closure of polls. In February, 2011, he held a press conference at which he announced that he was released on January 19 only after signing a pledge to collaborate with the Belarus secret police, still named after its Soviet predecessor the KGB.
Fearing persecution, Mikhalevich then fled Belarus without a passport and in March 2011 he was granted asylum in the Czech Republic.
