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01/20/2005
On a one day visit to the Czech Republic, Austrian Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel warned Czechs against rejecting the EU Constitution in a national referendum. He said such a move would harm the small and medium sized members of the EU and would be a major step back for Europe. His Czech counterpart Stanislav Gross agreed that putting the Constitution in question would be a big mistake which would isolate the Czech Republic from the EU mainstream. Czech politicians are divided over the EU Constitution. Although the Czech coalition government supports it, the country's main opposition party of right-wing Civic Democrats as well as President Klaus are opposed to it.
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01/20/2005
During talks with the Czech Prime Minister Stanislav Gross, the Austrian Chancellor also said his country would welcome a gesture of reconciliation from the Czech government towards the ethnic German minority which was expelled from Czechoslovakia after WWII. Mr. Schuessel said his country was still learning from the painful experience of the war and that it would value a similar approach from the Czech Republic. Not all members of the German ethnic minority were necessarily guilty, and it would be fair to recognize that, the Chancellor said. The Czech Prime Minister failed to respond to the appeal. The expulsion of some 2.5 million ethnic Germans after the war remains a sensitive issue on both sides of the border.
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01/20/2005
Parliament's Committee for Foreign Affairs has criticized the government for allegedly giving too little humanitarian aid to developing countries and tsunami devastated south-east Asia. The head of the committee Vladimir Lastuvka said that the sums earmarked for humanitarian aid did not correspond to the country's economic means. He did not specify how much higher the donations should be. The Czech Republic contributed 700 million crowns to the EU Development Fund last year. In the wake of the tsunami disaster the government earmarked 15 million crowns for humanitarian aid and another 200 million for reconstruction. Czechs have collected over 269 million crowns in public donations.
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01/20/2005
An Olomouc regional court has rehabilitated former counter intelligence agent Vladimir Hucin clearing him of charges of illegal possession of weapons that he was to have committed almost thirty years ago. The judge ruled that since the weapons in his possession were not fully functional Hucin did not commit any crime. Hucin said he was satisfied with the verdict but described it as a Pyrrhic victory. In 1977 Hucin was convicted to nine months in prison by the communist authorities for allegedly collecting weapons and explosives to be used against the regime. He denied the allegations.
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01/19/2005
The European Commission has approved the Czech Republic's plans to financially compensate those who will be hit the hardest by the restructuring of the national railway operator Ceske Drahy. The Czech government expects to spend a total of 1.86 billion Czech crowns (77.5 million US dollars) to compensate Ceske Drahy employees who will have to be laid off.
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01/19/2005
The Czech Parliament's defence and foreign affairs committees have asked legislators to approve the government's proposal to extend the mission of Czech military police stationed in Iraq. The group of about one hundred military police is based in southern Iraq and is helping to train local police there. The mission was to return home at the end of February, but the government recommended last week that it stay on till the end of the year. The lower house of parliament is expected to discuss the extension, which will cost the Defence Ministry around 175 million crowns (just over 7 million US dollars), at Friday's session.
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01/19/2005
The dominant fixed-line operator Cesky Telecom wants to outsource its network maintenance operations to the German electronics giant Siemens, as part of stringent cost-cutting plans. In an interview for the German business daily Handelsblatt, the Cesky Telecom chairman Gabriel Berdar said the company would do a trial run for a couple of months. If it works out, a deal could be sealed in the second or third quarter of this year. The move would cut around 3,300 jobs at Cesky Telecom, in which the Czech government wants to sell a 51-percent stake, the newspaper said.
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01/18/2005
The number of Czechs missing in the wake of the tsunami disaster in south-east Asia has dropped to nine. In seven cases there are fears that the missing Czechs did not survive the disaster. Thailand has received documents and DNA samples to aid the identification process, but the Czech Foreign Ministry has warned friends and relatives that it could be a long process. The Czech Republic has one confirmed casualty to date.
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01/18/2005
The Czech President Vaclav Klaus and the visiting Maltese President Fenech-Adami disagreed over EU matters during talks in Prague on Tuesday. While the Maltese head of state said that further EU integration was a positive thing and would be further improved by the adoption of the European Constitution, President Klaus warned of "dangers ahead" and criticized Brussels for trying to centrally direct people's lives. Similarly as the right wing Civic Democratic Party, which he established, President Klaus believes that the European Constitution would restrict the country's sovereignty.
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01/18/2005
The Czech Finance Ministry has proposed an amendment to the lottery law which would tighten the criteria for licenses-holders and applicants. The proposed amendment should make the business more transparent and prevent casinos and lotteries being used for money-laundering.
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