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Some members of the Czech cabinet say the government should consider cutting the budget of the Office of the President following a controversial pardon. On Tuesday Miloš Zeman’s team said he had pardoned a forestry chief at the Lány presidential retreat who had been sentenced to three years and fined CZK 1.8 million for corruption, a move which has been widely condemned.

The minister for science, Helena Langšádlová, said reducing the president’s budget should be discussed as Mr. Zeman had abuse his office.

Transport minister Martin Kupka said the head of state had spat in the face of society and that the government should weigh its response carefully.

Miloš Zeman has awarded a presidential pardon to the former head of the Lány Forestry Administration Miloš Balák, who was recently sentenced to three years in prison for manipulating a CZK 200 million public tender. The president took Balák’s “integrity and diligence” into consideration and came to the conclusion that Balák’s criminal act was less responsible for his sentencing rather than where he works, Prague Castle spokesman Jiří Ovčáček announced in a press release sent to the Czech News Agency on Tuesday.

Mr Balák told daily Deník N that he had asked the president for the pardon himself and that he is grateful that Miloš Zeman had helped him in a crucial moment of his life.

The Lány Forestry Administration is a contributory organization of the Office of the President of the Republic, Miloš Balák was a subordinate of the President's Chancellor Vratislav Mynář.

On Tuesday afternoon, the Chamber of Deputies approved a government request to extend the state of emergency in the Czech Republic until May 31st. Opposition parties abstained from the vote.

The government said that that the legal instrument needed to be extended in order for Ukrainian refugees to get accommodation via regional assistance centres. The state of emergency is also necessary for immediate purchases of essentials, says a government paper.

The opposition ANO party proposed extending the state of emergency for a shorter 30 day period instead.

The coalition government has a comfortable majority in the lower house.

Five Jas-39 Gripen jets of the Czech Air Force took off from the airbase in Čáslav to land in Lithuania’s city of Šiauliai on Tuesday where they will be helping to secure Baltic airspace. The Czech pilots will take over this operational task from the Danish Air Force from April 1 until the end of July. The fighter jets will be used to ensure that aircraft are upholding international air traffic rules, the commander of the Čáslav air base, Jaroslav Míka, said.

This is the fourth time that Czech pilots will be guarding the Baltic airspace and the seventh time in total that the Czech Air Force has been deployed to protect NATO member states.