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06/18/2004
The lower house of parliament has passed a bill on registered partnerships of same-sex couples in its first reading. The bill, proposed by deputies, will now be sent on to the committee stage, and then be put to a full vote in the lower house. Bills on registered partnerships for homosexuals regularly divide opinion in the lower house irrespective of party affiliations, with the junior government Christian Democrats the only one uniformly opposed. Supporters of the bill argue that public opinion polls have found that most Czechs have no objections to inscribing registered partnerships in the law.
The bill under discussion would, for instance, ensure partners the right to view information on each other's medical condition, and the chance to be treated as next-of-kin as regards inheritance, enjoying the same rights as married heterosexual couple. However, adoption by homosexual couples would remain illegal. Laws on civil unions for gay and lesbian couples are valid in eight European Union states, as well as in Iceland, Norway, and Switzerland. Such partnerships are also legal in six provinces of Spain and the city of London. Hungary allows homosexual couples the same rights as common-law unions.
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06/17/2004
The centre of the Moravian capital Brno was paralysed on Thursday, after a number of bomb scares caused widespread disruption and saw traffic rerouted for several hours. Police, alerted by concerned passers-by, sealed off two squares in the city centre and called in fire fighters, rescue workers, and bomb disposal experts to investigate two suspicious devices. None of the devices found contained explosives or proved dangerous. Several hours later, an anonymous caller warned of a bomb in the city's Palace of Justice. No bomb was found. Police say they are yet to determine why, how, and by whom the decoys in the city centre were made.
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06/17/2004
The lower house of parliament has approved a government proposal to get a loan from the European Investment Bank (EIB) for the completion of the D8 motorway, connecting the Czech Republic with Germany. The 12 billion crown loan would cover sixty percent of the cost of construction and is to be paid back within 25 years' time. The cabinet hopes to sign the loan contract with the EIB in September. The government proposal is yet to be approved by the senate and signed by the president.
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06/17/2004
Czech Foreign Minister Cyril Svoboda confirmed on Thursday that European conservative leaders picked EU External Relations Commissioner Chris Patten as their candidate to become the next head of the European Commission. Mr Svoboda is currently at the EU summit in Brussels, where the European constitution and a successor to Commission President Romano Prodi in November are the main topics on the agenda.
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06/17/2004
The country's public television station, Czech TV, has been fined 100,000 crowns for running commercials longer than granted by state law. According to the law, Czech TV can be fined between 5,000 and 2.5 million crowns if it runs commercials for over one hour a day. The Czech Council for Radio and Television Broadcasting, which imposed the fine, says commercials ran 29 seconds past the limit on February 2.
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06/17/2004
Czech Deputy Foreign Minister Petr Kolar will not be heading the United Nations mission in Kosovo, as proposed by the Czech Republic. UN Secretary General Kofi Annan has named Danish official Soren Jessen-Petersen as chief of the UN mission instead. Mr Jessen-Petersen succeeds former Finnish prime minister Harri Holkeri, who resigned for health reasons amid ethnic tensions in the Serbian province administered by the UN for the past five years. The choice of Jessen-Petersen, a lawyer and journalist by training who worked for the UN High Commission for Refugees in Africa in the 1970s, was seen as a surprise.
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06/17/2004
Prague's famous Laterna Magica theatre will be part of the cultural programme launching this year's summer Olympic Games in Greece. From August 8, it will hold performances on three nights in the town of Volos, which will be hosting the football matches.
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06/16/2004
The lower house of parliament has upheld the government's mandate for talks on the EU Constitution, which are due to take place in Brussels on Thursday and Friday. After a four-hour debate on Wednesday, the lower house of parliament did not approve a proposal by the opposition obliging the government to take the views of the opposition parties into consideration during the talks in Brussels. The defeated proposal also sought to prevent the "reduction" of the Czech Republic's independence in the EU. A week ago, the government supported the proposal that Czech negotiators should advocate equal position of small and big EU members. The cabinet is pushing for one EU commissioner for each EU member state and the establishment of a rotating 18-month EU presidency of three countries in the European Council.
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06/16/2004
Earlier this week, the chairman of the opposition Civic Democrats, Mirek Topolanek, sent letters to the Prague embassies of EU member states saying the coalition government's poor showing in the weekend's European parliamentary election meant it had lost its legitimacy to negotiate on issues such as the EU constitution on behalf of the Czechs. Mr Topolanek said it therefore made no sense for other EU member states to negotiate with the Social Democrat-led government. The ruling coalition sharply criticised the Civic Democrats' letter and diplomats said privately that it had been a faux pas.
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06/16/2004
The CTK news agency has reported that some senior Social Democrat party members have recommended to Prime Minister Vladimir Spidla that he step down at Saturday's party leadership meeting. An unnamed source from the party leadership is quoted as saying that the deputy Social Democrat chairman, Interior Minister Stanislav Gross, should take over as party head, while Mr Spidla could retain his position as Prime Minister. Mr Spidla is facing tough criticism from his party colleagues after the Social Democrats were routed in the European parliamentary elections. The party won only two of 24 Czech seats in the European Parliament in what analysts called a voter backlash against the party for abandoning its leftist roots two years after winning a general election. Prime Minister Spidla has called for a confidence vote from the Social Democrats on his party leadership on July 11, but has said defeat would not make him step down as prime minister.
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