News Sunday, AUGUST 08th, 1999
Hello and welcome to the programme. I'm Libor Kubik, first a look at the news headlines.
Those were the main points, now the news in more detail.
BRITAIN-HOLOCAUST-CZECH
London agreed on Saturday to the first compensation payments to Nazi victims who sent money to Britain for safekeeping during World War Two only to have it confiscated.
According to British Trade and Industry Secretary Stephen Byers, ten people will share over 130,000 pounds. They are the first group of Jews and other refugees to benefit under the plan to compensate people who survived the Nazis only to have their bank accounts in Britain seized because they came from countries considered Britain's wartime enemies.
Officials made a special appeal for the descendants of a Jew from wartime Czechoslovakia, Marck Kellermann. He had lodged a package containing a bracelet, tie pin and personal papers with the Bank of England in 1943, but these were confiscated. Britain would now like to give them back, but attempts to trace relatives of Kellermann have failed.
CZECH-HAVEL-GERMANY-AWARD
Czech President Vaclav Havel will next month receive Germany's prestigious Saint Adalbert Prize in recognition of his work to bring about spiritual and cultural unification of Europe.
Havel is to be decorated in the middle of September at a ceremony in the Slovak capital Bratislava. He will become the fifth annual winner of the prize sponsored by Germany's Saint Adalbert Foundation. Past winners include Poland's first post-Communist prime minister, Tadeusz Mazowiecki, and posthumously also Prague's Cardinal Frantisek Tomasek, who died 10 years ago this week.
Adalbert, or Vojtech was a tenth-century Czech missionary and martyr.
CZECH-GERMANY-CHRISTIAN
Czech and German Christians on Saturday met at a Greek Orthodox service in a church in the town of Kasperske Hory in the Bohemian Forest or Sumava -- a traditional pilgrimage shrine for believers from both neighbouring countries.
The meeting will culminate in Sunday's mass to be jointly celebrated by Papal Envoy Giovanni Coppa, Czech Catholic Bishop Antonin Liska and other church dignitaries.
Organiser Vladimir Horpeniak says the mass according to the Old Slavic liturgy is designed to enhance the international character of the project.
CZECH-ECLIPSE-POLL
One Czech in five expects Wednesday's total eclipse of the sun to produce a negative impact on their lives. Most of those polled on Saturday fear that natural disasters could follow the eclipse on August 11. Two thirds of those asked by the Sofres-Factum polling agency said they were going to watch this phenomenon.
One in every ten Czechs polled fear a major natural disaster could happen and almost six percent of the respondents believe it could be the end of the world. Some of those polled expect something serious to happen in outer space, others fear a major manmade disaster, such as revolution or war.
Wednesday's total eclipse of the sun will be visible along a hundred-kilometre-wide belt which in Europe will stretch from France to Romania. Observers in the southern parts of the Czech Republic will be able to witness a 98-percent eclipse around lunchtime.
The next total eclipse of the sun will occur on 7 October 2135, i.e. more than 37 years from now.
CZECH-WEATHER
Now for a look at the weather.
On Sunday, warm air will continue to pour into the Czech Republic from the south. Sunday will be a partly cloudy and wet day. Night-time lows from 14 to 18 degrees Celsius, daytime highs a stifling 27 to 31 degrees.
The warm air intrusion will culminate on Monday with daytime highs in the vicinity of 30 Celsius and early morning lows between 14 and 18 degrees. We expect frequent showers and thunderstorms.
I'm Libor Kubik and that's the end of the news.
