News

A Czech military field hospital in the southern Iraqi city of Basra has treated its first patients. Relatively few patients visited the hospital however, as Friday is a day of prayer for Muslims. The hospital is being guarded by British forces in control of Basra. Deputy Defence Minister Jaroslav Skopek said on Friday that the hospital would be working at full capacity by May 6.

President Klaus is not planning to mark his recent appointment by issuing an amnesty, his spokesman said on Friday, adding that while Mr Klaus regarded amnesties as important it would not be appropriate to issue one now. The president said before he was elected that he would not use his powers of amnesty or pardon to interfere in the legal system and frequently criticised his predecessor Vaclav Havel for doing so.

Meanwhile a dispute over the EU between Foreign Minister Cyril Svoboda and President Vaclav Klaus continued on Thursday, with Mr Svoboda again distancing himself from recent remarks made by the president. President Klaus said during last week's EU signing ceremony in Athens that his country would lose some of its sovereignty when it joins the Union, comments which were harshly criticised by Mr Svoboda. The Foreign Minister said in parliament on Thursday that equating EU membership with loss of sovereignty was the same as encouraging people not to vote in the forthcoming EU referendum. President Klaus has often been criticised for his negative comments about the European Union, which his country will join in May 2004.

President Vaclav Klaus who is on a one day visit to neighbouring Austria has said the Czech Republic is willing to talk but not to negotiate about the issue of the Sudeten Germans' expulsion after the Second World War. Mr Klaus added that for his part, he said all in a statement to mark the March anniversary of the Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia. At a joint press conference with Mr Klaus, the Austrian President Thomas Klestil said Austria felt the Sudeten German question had not yet been solved "in a satisfactory way". In recent years Austria has been pressing for a "gesture" by Prague over the Sudeten Germans issue. The Austrian right-wing Freedom Party also demanded formal abolition of the post-war Benes Decrees legitimising the expulsion, threatening that the Czechs would otherwise be barred from EU membership.

Since becoming President in succession to Vaclav Havel in early March, Mr Klaus has toured the Czech Republic's neighbouring countries to stress the importance of good neighbourly relations. Austria is his fourth stop after visits to Slovakia, Poland and Germany.