The Czechs in a Nutshell

Yet in the row of Czechoslovak presidents, starting with the alcoholised and syphilis-ridden Gottwald to the senile general Ludvík Svoboda to the tragic Quisling Gustav Husák, Masaryk represents an almost surreal ideal. And contrary to another Czechoslovak president-cum-moral-idol, Václav Havel, he has the advantage of not being viewed in a real-life context.

“To many Czechs, the words ‘Masaryk’s republic’ have become a declaration of faith and a mantra they use to declare that they are proud to be a part of this nation,” the historian Klimek maintains. “But it’s unacceptable when modern politicians glorify the legacy of Masaryk’s Czechoslovakia to use it as a whip on the Czech Republic of today.”

Mogilevich, Semyon Yudkovich

It’s 11 o’clock in the evening, on the 31st of May 1995. At the restaurant U Holubů (the Dove) in Prague’s Smíchov district, some 80 people, most of them Russians, are celebrating a birthday party with loads of caviar, champagne and oysters. Suddenly, the doors burst open. Almost 200 heavily armed policemen from the special squad fighting organized crime storm into the premises. Tables are turned over, furniture smashed, and all the party guests are handcuffed and arrested.

Photo © Terje B. Englund

The now-legendary police action, which most Czechs know as the Raid at the Dove, was meant to be a daring and devastating blow against the Russian mafia and its operations in post-Communist Central Europe. It turned out, however, to be mostly a failure. All the men in Armani suits and their half-naked “hostesses”, who were marched to black marias, were released within eight hours, and only three of them were later expelled from the Czech Republic.

And the biggest disappointment: Semyon Mogilevich, the Russian mafia’s alleged godfather in Central Europe, was not even present at the party. Because his flight from Israel was delayed, Mogilevich arrived at the spot some minutes after the raid had started (at least, that’s what he later told in an interview with the BBC). True to his reputation as a level-headed and resolute fellow, chain-smoking “Seva” immediately caught a cab and didn’t stop until he reached Budapest.

Nevertheless, the unsuccessful raid at The Dove confirmed what most Czechs already guessed: the Russian mafia (which in this context should be interpreted as Russian-speaking, since its members come from all parts of the former Soviet Union) has a strong foothold in the Czech Republic. They even feel secure enough to gather at a giant party in the middle of Prague. And Semyon Mogilevich, while absent at The Dove, has had the dubious honour of becoming the mafia’s “face” in the Czech Republic.

The mafia, however, could certainly have picked a duller boss. Through his rare appearances in the media, Mogilevich — also known as “Don the Brain” — fully confirms the rumours that he is extremely clever, cynical and witty. If he is also guilty of all the crimes which police investigators and secret services in numerous countries accuse him of, he is extremely ruthless and dangerous as well.

The Russian mafia’s Central European boss was born in Kiev in the Ukraine in 1946. His parents belonged to the “working intelligentsia”, but instead of pursuing an academic career after receiving his diploma at Lviv’s Faculty of Economics, young Mogilevich moved to Moscow, where he started working for a state company that ran public toilets at the city’s railway stations. The rather unglamorous job offered “Seva” a convenient cover for his real profession as a currency dealer on the black market.

In 1974, Mogilevich was sentenced to three years’ imprisonment for his black market activities. This was at the time when criminals in the former Soviet Union started to organize themselves, so when “Seva” was released three years later, he had emerged a boss of a gang now known as the Solomon Mafia. Mogilevich earned his first millions under Gorbachov’s glasnost in the early 1980s, when Soviet Jews, who mass-emigrated to Israel, needed “professional assistance” to get their hard currency and valuables — of course, minus a fat provision for “Seva” — with them across the Iron Curtain.