Record of Meeting between Moses Bhagwan and Central Committee of the Czechoslovakian Communist Party

XO/597

Record

From the international journalism conference in Baden a journalist came to Czechoslovakia, Bhagvan Mozert [sic, Moses Bhagwan], from the journal Thunder – the organ of the People’s Progressive Party of British Guiana. Through the Organization of Journalists he asked for a conversation with the Central Committee of the Czechoslovakian Communist Party. He presented a letter of endorsement on party letterhead but without a stamp and with an unreadable signature.

According to the letter, he was empowered to interact with Communist parties to ask for assistance with the upcoming election campaign of spring 1961. According to him, the election will determine if English colonialism will end.

A worker of the international division of the Central Committee of the Czechoslovakian Communist Party, Comrade Novotný, who had conversation with him, told him that the request will be considered and he will receive the answer. The intermediary in the relationship between European Communist Parties and the People’s Progressive Party, according to Mozert [sic], is Billy Stracken [sic],^[1] 146 Calling Crescent, Colindale, London, NW 9/.

From Czechoslovakia Bhagvan [sic] went to the USSR, China and to Cuba. In the USSR and also in China he will most probably make the same request.

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Up until now, the Central Committee of the Czechoslovakian Communist Party has not had contact with British Guiana’s People’s Progressive Party. The only occasion in which that party turned to Czechoslovakian organs was in terms of trade. That party ordered a printing press with a price of £3,000. That international trade was recommended by the Czechoslovakian embassy with good payment terms and they were allowed to buy it through credit paid over time rather than cash.

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The 12^th Division of the Central Committee of the Czechoslovakian Communist Party recommends consulting with the Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party in regard to relations with the People’s Progressive Party.

November 22, 1960 [Signature]

^[1] Billy Strachan was a Jamaican Communist who was based in England. He often acted as an intermediary between the People’s Progressive Party and European Communist Parties.