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Czech Villages Get Ready for American Radar
The Czech Security Council decided on Tuesday to assign land 2 km. from the village of Misov and 90 km. southwest of Prague, on the edge of the 26,000-ha. Brdy military training area in western Bohemia. Local sources say that 90 percent of the area's residents are opposed to the American installation. American geologists and hydrologists recommended the area this spring. It has been used by various military for nearly a century.
The wooded highland was first used by the new military Czechoslovakian in the 1920s as a training and testing ground for equipment made nearby. In 1935-1936, Czechoslovakia was the world's leading arms producer. The Germans also used the area during the 1939-1945 occupation. It then returned to the national military, until the Soviets replaced them with the “temporary” introduction of forces in August 1968.
Fifteen or so of the villages surrounding the base held referenda on the placement of the American radar facility, all of which showed strong opposition to it. Although those referenda have no force and were unlikely to influence the center-right national government, Czech Interior Minister Karel Schwarzenberg, U.S. Ambassador to the Czech Republic Richard Graber and prominent Czech politicians met with village mayors. “We assumed the radar would be placed somewhere deep inside the base and not on its edge close to us,” the mayor of Misov said.
Older residents, who remember the Germans and Russians who used the base without particularly problem, expect the Americans to be no worse. One of the Misov mayor's assistants commented that “We still don't have a sewer system in the village. Maybe the Americans' arrival will help speed it up.”
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of July 05, 2007
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