Associated Press / Robert H. Reid, Associated Press Writer
PRAGUE, Czech Republic (AP) -- Police on Thursday refused to allow American and Italian activists to enter the country to join protests when International Monetary Fund and World Bank officials meet here next week.
The government is also moving police reinforcements into the Czech capital to prevent a repeat of the disorder that marked the conference of the World Trade Organization in Seattle and last spring's meeting of the IMF in Washington, D.C.
Late Wednesday, a group of 70 activists traveling from Hanover, Germany, to Prague by bike arrived at the German-Czech border northwest of the capital.
Protest organizers said two Italians and one American, Kay Morrison of Seattle, were refused permission to enter the Czech Republic early Thursday.
The others were camped with them Thursday on the German side of the border waiting to decide what to do next, according to a member of the protest group, Viktor Piorecky.
IMF and World Bank officials open their three-day annual joint conference Tuesday in this former communist capital to discuss the state of the global economy and reforms in the two pillars of global capitalism.
A disparate group -- including human rights activists, environmentalists, anarchists, communists and far right-wing skinheads -- has announced plans for protests during the conference.
"We want the IMF and World Bank to shut down," said Alice Dvorska, a spokeswoman for INPEG, an umbrella organization coordinating the protests. "Any form of dialogue will only improve their 'PR' and that's not what we have in mind."
On the opening day of the conference, Dvorska said protesters plan to surround the Congress Center along the Vltava River to prevent delegates from leaving the building.
"We do not have to be there forever or in the millions," Dvorska said when asked if protesters would try to block the center indefinitely. "It will be largely symbolic."
To prevent trouble, 1,500 additional police from throughout the country arrived Wednesday, joining 1,000 others sent here the day before, according to the Czech news agency CTK.
Many of the protesters are expected from elsewhere in Europe and as a precaution, German authorities have stepped up controls along the Czech border to screen out troublemakers.
The German Interior Ministry said anyone found with materials indicating they are planning violence or to disrupt law and order would be turned back.
The new head of the IMF, Horst Koehler, has announced plans for broad reforms to give poor countries a bigger voice in globalization.
These include proposals to reassess the influential voting rights of a handful of rich countries and to give special loan packages to 10 more of the world's poorest nations by the end of the year.
Koehler, who took office in May amid high hopes the often-criticized IMF can be revamped, said inclusiveness was a real theme for the summit.
To that end, Koehler said the IMF is reviewing independent recommendations for a more simplified voting structure.
The Washington-based organization, made up of 182 member countries, currently bases voting rights on a country's economic strength.
Critics say the decision process is unfairly weighted in favor of the United States, which holds 17 percent of the vote, and the rest of the Group of Seven richest industrialized countries.
This article is Copyright 2000 by The Associated Press.:
