• 06/12/2004

    The Defence Minister, Miroslav Kostelka, paid a brief visit on Friday to the Czech special forces unit in Afghanistan. The elite troops from the Prostejov military base are on a 6-month mission in the mountains of Afghanistan as part of the US-led anti-terrorist operation Enduring Freedom. They are being deployed in operations involving fighting Taliban and Al-Qaeda supporters. Minister Kostelka said the Czech soldiers had earned great respect from the allied units.

  • 06/12/2004

    The Czech Republic's top officials attended a memorial ceremony on Saturday on the site of Lidice, the Central Bohemian village that the Nazis razed to the ground 62 years ago in retaliation for the assassination of the Reichsprotektor Reinhard Heydrich. Speaking at the ceremony, President Vaclav Klaus said that Europe had a new chance to overcome the wounds of the past. Both President Klaus and Prime Minister Vladimir Spidla criticised attempts at revising history and playing down the Lidice atrocity. On June 10th 1942, 173 men were shot and the women and children were transported to concentration camps. Of the children only seventeen survived.

  • 06/11/2004

    For the first time ever, Czechs will be sending their own elected representatives to the European Parliament. Czechs were the first of the 10 new EU member states to vote in the elections with polling stations opening at 2 pm on Friday throughout the Czech Republic and closing at 10 in the evening. The voting is to continue on Saturday, with the polling stations opening at 8 in the morning and closing at 2 in the afternoon. The final surveys released before voting got underway on Friday suggested that about 30-40 percent of the 8 million-plus Czechs who are eligible to vote were likely to do so. Over 730 people are in the running for the 24 seats allotted to the Czech Republic in the European Parliament, representing 31 different political parties and groupings.

    Author: Brian Kenety
  • 06/11/2004

    Czech police are investigating two more football officials who have been implicated in a bribery scandal that erupted last month. Prosecutor Pavel Pukovec told Czech Radio that football referee Petr Rehor is suspected of having agreed to accept a bribe to favour Synot in its match against Zlin in the top Czech football division. Meanwhile an official of Synot, Igor Stefanko, is being prosecuted for offering a bribe of 200,000 crowns (about $8,000) to the Slovak referee Eduard Cichy to influence a March 13 match at which Synot faced Teplice. So far, seven people, five of them referees, have been accused in the scandal. If tried and convicted, they face up to two years in prison.

    Author: Brian Kenety
  • 06/11/2004

    The police have brought criminal charges against Jan Karas, the doctor who on Monday drove his car into a two-year-old girl and her mother. The accident occurred on the grounds of Prague's Vinohrady teaching hospital, where Dr. Karas held a high position. A deputy state prosecutor said that Dr. Karas had been charged with drunk driving and causing grievous bodily harm. The two-year-old girl, who suffered serious head injuries and damage to her internal organs, is being kept in hospital under anaesthesia, is due to undergo additional surgery next week.

    Author: Brian Kenety
  • 06/11/2004

    Another suspected case of BSE or mad cow disease has been reported on a farm near the east Bohemian town of Trutnov. The four-year old cow first showed symptoms of BSE in May. Further tests have yet to confirm whether the animal really suffered from mad cow disease.

    Author: Brian Kenety
  • 06/11/2004

    The Czech national football squad arrived in Portugal on Thursday afternoon to begin their final training sessions ahead of their opening match in the Euro 2000 championship. This coming Tuesday, the Czech Republic faces Latvia, who have never before made it to the European Championship, and are not expected to pose much of a challenge for the Czech team.

    Author: Brian Kenety
  • 06/10/2004

    The Czech Republic has reopened its embassy to North Korea. The mission is headed by charge d'affairs Miroslav Podhajsky. On Wednesday, the embassy started distributing humanitarian aid that the Czech Republic had sent following the tragic railway accident in North Korea earlier this year that killed 170 people. North Korean authorities first expressed interest in the reopening of the Czech embassy last year. The Czechoslovak embassy to Pyongyang was closed in the early 1990s.

  • 06/10/2004

    Another suspected case of BSE or mad cow disease has been reported on a farm near the east Bohemian town of Trutnov. The four-year old cow first showed symptoms of BSE in May. Further tests have yet to confirm whether the animal really suffered from mad cow disease. So far, eleven cases of BSE have been confirmed in the Czech Republic, the first one in 2001.

  • 06/10/2004

    A tornado hit the Moravian district of Olomouc on Wednesday afternoon, killing one man and causing damage worth tens of millions of crowns. The man was killed when a tree fell on his car. The tornado tore away roofs and knocked down dozens of trees. Also many houses were flooded after intensive rain in the region. Meteorologists say that several tornadoes occur every year in the Czech Republic.

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