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Czechia and six other EU member states are calling for the European Union to speed up the accession process for the Western Balkan candidate countries of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Albania. The new group of seven countries, which aside from Czechia and Austria also includes Slovakia, Slovenia, Croatia, Greece and Italy, is called Friends of the Western Balkans and was presented by the Austrian Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg at the Europa-Forum Wachau on Friday.

Addressing the other EU member states and the European Commission in a declaration signed by the foreign ministers of the seven countries, the Friends of the Western Balkans group called for "accelerated integration with concrete steps for 2024 and beyond", adding that the EU accession process was too slow, too complex and too bureaucratic. The signatories say the process has so far brought few tangible results for the people of the Western Balkan candidate countries, especially young people, which has led to disappointment and alienation from the EU.

The group stressed that the recent violent events in northern Kosovo have shown that unresolved tensions and long-term conflicts can undermine stability in the Western Balkans region, which is surrounded by EU countries. According to the APA agency, Czech Foreign Minister Jan Lipavský called for greater courage from the EU and the Western Balkan countries in solving unresolved issues.

If elections had been held in May, the opposition ANO party would have won with 34.5 percent of the vote, according to a Median agency poll published on Friday. Petr Fiala's Civic Democrat Party would have trailed behind in second place with 15 percent, while the Pirate Party would have come in third with 10.5 percent. Tomio Okamura's populist right-wing Freedom and Direct Democracy party would have been fourth with 8.5 percent.

According to the survey, the parties that form the current governing coalition would have the cumulative support of 41 percent of voters, two percentage points less than in April. They would thus gain 92 parliamentary seats. At the moment, they have 108.

Median said that it was unclear whether the Mayors and Independents, TOP 09, the Christian Democrats and the Social Democrats would have gained the five percent of votes necessary to be represented in parliament.

Friday is expected to bring cooler temperatures between 19 and 23 degrees Celsius. It will be mostly cloudy with sporadic showers and rain, especially in the north, west and east, and some patches of sun, mostly in the eastern half of the country.

Czechia has fallen in the World Economic Forum's global gender equality index, the Czech News Agency reported on Thursday. The country is currently ranked 101st out of 146 countries, 25 places lower than it was last year. Its sudden slump is mainly down to its low score in the area of equal representation of men and women in politics, where it fell from 67th place last year to 108th this year. It also ranked relatively poorly in the field of economic participation and opportunity, where the gender pay gap and the proportion of women on executive boards plays a role.

According to the WEF report, Europe has the highest gender parity of all regions at 76.3%, with 20 out of 36 countries having at least 75% gender parity and one-third of European countries ranking in the top 20 worldwide. However, the Czech Republic was named in the report, along with Hungary and Cyprus, as one of the countries ranking at the bottom in the region.

The WEF index compares gender equality in different countries around the world anually in four areas: education, work, politics, and health.