Czech president warns of growing reach of terrorist group

Prague, June 28 (ČTK) — The accepting of migrants largely facilitates Islamic State’s (IS) expansion to Europe, Czech President Miloš Zeman said in an interview with Parlamentni listy.cz server, adding that all UN Security Council standing members must be persuaded of the need to intervene against IS.

Zeman has long been pushing for a military action against IS. He has also supported the Facebook initiative We Do not Want Islam in the Czech Republic.

“If European countries accept a wave of migrants, there will be terrorist groups among them, of which also a Libyan minister has warned. By accepting the migrants, we strongly facilitate Islamic State’s expansion to Europe,” Zeman said.

Thousands of refugees from Libya, where militant Islamist groups operate, some of which have promised loyalty to Islamic State, have been heading for Europe across the Mediterranean over the past weeks.

Zeman has repeatedly warned of accepting refugees from the Middle East and Africa by the Czech Republic.

Zeman said IS is an organization with many branches that have already more or less got control of Libya, and they partially dominate Afghanistan, Iraq, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Somalia, Syria and Yemen, too.

With terrorist attacks like those in Tunisia and Kuwait on Friday, IS branches are preparing for getting control of other countries, Zeman said.

On Friday, Zeman said IS must be fought by destroying its bases.

“Unfortunately, due to the cowardice, stupidity of a number of civilised countries that have not been ready to create the international forces, several more hundreds, if not thousands of innocent people will die,” Zeman told the server.

Zeman plans to present his proposal for a joint action against IS at the U.N.General Assembly session in September. He said Russian President Vladimir Putin has already expressed agreement with the proposal.

“Other U.N. Security Council standing members must still be persuaded. The Chinese President (Xi Jinping) has told me that he is already negotiating about cooperation with (U.S.) President (Barack) Obama. Unfortunately, Western Europe is most heavily poisoned with appeasement,” Zeman said.

He compared the current stance of the West on IS to its approach to Hitler before World War II.

Zeman supported the activities of the Initiative We Do Not Want Islam in the Czech Republic.

“Me, too, I do not want Islam in the Czech Republic,” he said.

At the same time, he dismissed the criticism of his statements on Islam, contained in the U.S. State Department’s report that annually assesses the attitude to human rights in individual countries of the world.