• Czechia sending temporary bridges to flooded areas in Slovenia
    09/04/2023

    Czech firefighters are transporting temporary bridges to Slovenia, which is struggling to deal with the worst floods in the country’s modern history. The Czech army has sent 30 engineers and soldiers to erect the bridges across the Meža River and help with the reconstruction effort over the next two months, the Czech Army said on social networks. Widespread flooding hit Slovenia in early August. It claimed several lives, affected two-thirds of the country, damaged infrastructure and homes and caused damages estimated at half a billion euros.
    Author: Daniela Lazarová

  • Data show record-long decline in real wages in Czechia

    09/04/2023

    Real wages in Czechia have declined year-on-year for seven successive quarters, the longest ever uninterrupted period of decline in the country’s history, the ctk news agency reported. According to   data released by the Czech Statistics Office the average monthly wage in the 2Q rose by 7.7 percent to 43,193 crowns. Taking into account inflation of 11.1 percent the average real wage dropped by 3.1 percent. However due to falling inflation the decline in real wages in the second quarter was the lowest since the 4Q of 2021.
    Author: Daniela Lazarová

  • Platform for Social Housing highlights lack of municipal flats in Prague
    09/04/2023

    The Platform for Social Housing erected over 50 tents outside Prague City Hall on Sunday evening to highlight the plight of families who were unable to obtain municipal housing in 2023. The protest, held on the eve of a meeting of the City Council, was aimed against the deputy mayor for health and social care, Alexandra Udženija, who is being blamed for the lack of municipal housing. According to the platform, the situation of people in need may further worsen with the possible approval of stricter new rules on the allocation of municipal flats.
    Author: Daniela Lazarová

  • Labour minister: President’s hesitation will cost treasury 4 billion crowns
    09/04/2023

    The president’s hesitation in signing into force a bill tightening the conditions for early retirement and the subsequent one-month delay in bringing it into force will cost the state  treasury up to 4 billion crowns,  Labour Minister Marian Jurečka said on Czech Television. Thousands of Czechs close to retirement age scrambled to file for early retirement over the summer under more advantageous conditions and Jurečka said their numbers could increase by another 10,000 in October. Originally the government hoped to enforce the new legislation from September 1st.

    The president was hesitant to sign the bill, arguing that in times of high inflation the newly-proposed indexation of pensions could be more costly than the present arrangement and criticizing the decision to cut the possibility of early retirement from five to three years ahead of the projected date as “too abrupt”. Nevertheless, he eventually put his signature to it, saying it was “a step in the right direction”.
    Author: Daniela Lazarová

  • Dancer from iconic musical The Hop Pickers Ivana Pavlová dies at 77
    09/04/2023

    Dancer and actress Ivana Pavlová, who starred as Hanka in the iconic 1964 Czech musical The Hop Pickers, has died at the age of 77. Pavlova took ballet classes from the age of five, graduating from the Prague Dance Conservatory, and later performed with the Ballet-Prague ensemble. She also performed at Prague’s famous Laterna Magica.
    Author: Daniela Lazarová

  • Muchova reaches US Open quarterfinals
    09/04/2023

    Karolina Muchova reached the quarterfinals of the US Open on Sunday with a 6-3, 5-7, 6-1 victory over Wang Xinyu. For the 10th-seeded Czech, a 2021 Australian Open semifinalist who has reached the quarterfinals of Wimbledon twice, it marked her deepest run ever at Flushing Meadows. Muchova’s next opponent is No. 30 Sorana Cirstea who beat 15th-seeded Belinda Bencic in Sunday’s match.

  • Czech and Ukrainian orchestras to perform concert in Prague as tribute to war victims
    09/03/2023

    A hundred bell towers across Prague will ring in unison at 6pm on Sunday to pay tribute to victims of the war in Ukraine. The bell ringing will be a prelude to a special concert at Vladislav Hall at Prague Castle in which the Prague Philharmonia, Czech Philharmonic and the Kyiv Symphony Orchestra will come together to perform Benjamin Britten’s War Requiem, based on poetry written by Wilfred Owen, a British war poet who was a victim of World War I.

  • Weather forecast
    09/03/2023

    Monday should be clear to partly cloudy with day temperatures between 20 and 24 degrees Celsius.

  • Ministry drafts bill stating that corporal punishment of children is “unacceptable”
    09/03/2023

    The Justice Ministry has drafted an amendment to the Civil Code stating that corporal punishment of children is unacceptable. It does not however introduce penalties for parents who choose to employ spanking or slapping as a disciplinary measure. The aim of the amendment is reportedly to make parents consider more appropriate educational means. The move is part of a broader governmental plan to combat domestic violence. According to the outcome of a July poll two-thirds of Czech parents use or have used physical punishment when dealing with their kids’ misbehavior.
    Author: Daniela Lazarová

  • Vondroušová in US Open fourth round
    09/03/2023

    Wimbledon champion Marketa Vondroušová advanced to the last 16 of the US Open by beating Russian Ekaterina Alexandrova 6-2, 6-1 at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in New York on Saturday. Vondroušová, ranked No 9, will next play American Peyton Stearns. The Czech has now won 10 matches in a row at the Majors after her surprising run to the Wimbledon title while being ranked 42nd in the world.

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