By A.M. Goldstein

HAIFA —Vaclav Havel, former president of the Czech Republic , warned yesterday that a neo-fascism was overtaking the former Communist world and showing signs of globalization.

Speaking at the opening of the University of Haifa 's 34^th Board of Governors Meeting, Havel said, "Radical nationalism under the guise of ending the Communist era has been bringing to power people waving the flag of nationalism.  But they are xenophobic, detesting minorities of any kind.

"One of the hundred of faces of the phenomenon," he stated in obvious reference to Iran , is when "a big country threatens another, smaller country."

There was need, he advised, to "start a bold new political order, to base it on equality of different cultures, respect for a higher order." 

The neo-fascists, he went on, "act in a more refined manner (than did the Communists) to purify the society for the sake of public health," the human rights activist continued.  This meant, he explained, that they suspected, and did not tolerate, any expression of civil society.  They were intent only on concentrating power.

Havel, the first president of post-communist Czechoslovakia and one of the former leaders of that  country's Velvet Revolution that gained it freedom from the Soviet orbit, also warned of "latent neo-fascism in various environments and on different continents." 

There was, he told his University of Haifa audience, "a need to return the demons (of fascism) to mythology."  But it was a task, he said somewhat pessimistically, that he hoped would be done by future generations.

The University of Haifa conferred an honorary degree on Havel, who was also president of the Czech Republic after the break-up of Czechoslovakia , for "his dedication to the preservation of human rights."

A.M. Goldstein is the English language editor for the University of Haifa's Department of External Affairs.