Agriculture ministry to look into farmers' cooperatives property returns

Agriculture minister Petr Gandalovic has prepared a special bill that ascertains whether former members of farmers' cooperatives have actually got their former property back under the de-nationalisation process which followed the fall of communism. Hospodarske Noviny reports that the private companies from which the cooperatives were formed would be held responsible for any failed returns. Mr Gandalovic tells the paper that tens of thousands of people who had rights to property in the privatisation process have issued complaints. The property in question is worth billions of crowns, he adds. The agriculture minister plans to put his bill forward at a government session in the near future.