Emotions run high in lower house as MPs accuse deputy prime minister of treason

MPs met behind closed doors on Tuesday to debate allegations that Czech Deputy Prime Minister Jan Hamáček had planned a trip to Russia aiming to hush up the involvement of Russian agents in the 2014 Vrbětice explosions in return for one million Sputnik V vaccines and the right to host a US-American summit in Prague. Seznam.cz made the claim on Tuesday citing several independent sources and linking the story to Jan Hamáček’s planned visit to Russia which was cancelled just hours before the Vrbětice scandal broke.

The opposition parties have branded the deputy prime minister a traitor and are calling for a thorough investigation into the matter. A session of the lower house, attended by the heads off the country’s intelligence services, the supreme state attorney and the police president, turned into a slinging match and had to be suspended.

Mr. Hamáček has vehemently denied the accusation, insisting that the announced visit to Moscow was merely a smoke screen to get the Czech ambassador to Russia back to Prague for consultations without raising suspicion. However the prime minister never confirmed his version of the story and the planned visit was never satisfactorily explained.