Klaus and Hasenkopf take amnesty dispute to media

Former president Václav Klaus told the Právo daily on Saturday that he was exclusively responsible for the text of the controversial New Year’s amnesty. This was in reaction to this week’s statement by the current chancellor at Prague castle Vratislav Mynář that the real authors of the amnesty were Mr Klaus’ former advisors Petr Hájek, Ladislav Jakl a Pavel Hasenkopf. Earlier in the week Mr Hasenkopf, who was a lawyer at Prague Castle said that part of the amnesty was prepared by the Justice Ministry. Mr Klaus denied ever asking Mr Hasenkopf to help him prepare the text of the amnesty, which put to an end a number of controversial corruption cases. In reaction to the former president’s statement, Mr Hasenkopf posted on his Facebook accounts a copy of an email from Mr Jakl from last year forwarding a request from the president to create a draft of the amnesty.