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04/22/2006
A new Czech consulate has opened in Toronto, which is home to the largest number of Czech immigrants in Canada. Foreign Minister Cyril Svoboda attended the opening ceremonies on Friday as part of his 4-day state visit to Canada. The Toronto consulate is the third in Canada; the other two are located in Montreal and Calgary. The Czech foreign minister is also scheduled to meet with Canadian government officials to discuss the issue of visa requirements. Visa relations are currently not asymmetrical, as Czech citizens require a visa to visit Canada, but Canadians have not required a visa for the Czech Republic since May 1st, 2004.
Czech writer Josef Skvorecky and his wife, Zdena Salivarova, who settled in Toronto in the 1960s and established the exile publishing house Sixty-Eight Publishers, were also honoured by the Czech foreign minister for their good work promoting the Czech Republic. Since 1969, Skvorecky and Salivarova have published over 220 books, the bulk of them banned by the Czechoslovak communist censors prior to 1989.
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04/22/2006
Former Social Democratic prime minister Stanislav Gross is returning to political life as the new head of the Social Democratic Party's Committee on Security. The news has raised speculation over whether Gross' return could harm the Social Democratic Party in the upcoming June elections. The party's acting head, Bohuslav Sobotka, says that the decision will not have a negative effect on his party at the polls. A year ago Stanislav Gross resigned as Czech prime minister and then as chairman of his party over a financing scandal connected to his Prague apartment.
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04/22/2006
Martin Tancos and Zdenek Simbersky, two Czech citizens who spent two years in a Turkish jail, have returned to Prague. The two were serving time for heroin smuggling, but earlier this week a Turkish court released them when the real perpetrators were uncovered. Tancos and Simbersky were arrested in April 2004 while crossing the Turkish-Greek border; they had been hired to transport textiles from Turkey to the Czech Republic and say they unknowingly became accomplices in a heroine trafficking operation.
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04/22/2006
For the 15th year in a row, Czechs are celebrating Earth Day this weekend. There are a number of organized group bike rides happening throughout the country, and the Prague Zoo is hosting an event highlighting recycling. The leader of the Green Party, Martin Bursik, is taking part in public events; polls show that the Greens may gain enough votes to make it into parliament after the next elections. Earth Day has been celebrated since 1970 and it became an internationally recognized day in 1990.
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04/21/2006
The lower house has passed a new labour code, outvoting the Senate which has previously rejected the bill. It has yet to be signed into law by the president. MPs for the ruling Social Democrats and opposition Communists voted for the new labour code, saying it allows for a greater freedom of contract while ensuring necessary protection for employees. Critics of the new labour code argue it will reduce competitiveness and increase costs for employers.
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04/21/2006
The CTK news agency has reported that only a very small number of Czechs living abroad have registered to vote in the upcoming general elections before Sunday's deadline. The largest number, around 360, have registered both in Slovakia and the United States though estimates say tens of thousands of Czechs live in either country. Some 220 have applied in the Belgian capital Brussels, some 150 in Paris and just 60 in both Australia and New Zealand. Czechs living abroad had their first chance to cast their votes at Czech embassies in 2002. Out of an estimated 70,000 people entitled to vote, only 3,700 used the possibility.
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04/21/2006
The Morava River management says this year's floods have caused the company damage worth 770 million crowns (32 million dollars), which is twice as much as during the floods which hit the region in 2002. The director of the state company, Pavel Mylbachr, said that the swollen streams had damaged dams and dykes and riverbeds had silted up in places.
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04/21/2006
German officials have accepted responsibility for an illegal waste dump in Libceves in North Bohemia. Following talks in Saxony on Thursday, the local authorities said they were prepared to pay for its removal. The issue of illegally imported waste from Germany has strained Czech-German relations in recent months and been addressed at the highest level. Since the beginning of the year, an estimated 20 thousand tonnes of German waste has been dumped in the Czech border areas. The Czech police have now charged six people, including a German citizen, over the illegal imports. If convicted they may be sent to five years in prison.
Meanwhile the Czech Environment Inspection Office has ordered the Bau 24 company to pay a fine of 10 million crowns (416,000 dollars) for illegally dumping rubbish in Libceves. The company's representative has appealed against the fine.
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04/21/2006
Fugitive businessman Radovan Krejcir, who escaped from the Czech Republic to the Seychelles last year, has been acquitted from charges in the case of a three-million-crown fraud. The Regional Court in Prague on Friday upheld an earlier verdict of a district court. This is the first valid verdict in Mr Krejcir's criminal cases. Radovan Krejcir fled the police during a search of his villa outside Prague last June. Criminal proceedings have been launched against him in several property and violent criminal cases. Mr Krejcir lives in the Seychelles with his wife and son.
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04/21/2006
The lower house has again passed a bill on non-profit hospitals, drafted by the ruling Social Democrats and supported by the opposition Communists, as 107 out of the 171 deputies present overrode the Senate's veto on Friday. To become law, the bill has yet to be signed by President Vaclav Klaus. Critics of the bill on non-profit hospitals say it will harm patients and threaten the existence of some hospitals. Supporters of the legislation argue the new system will guarantee the availability of health care to everybody.
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