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Beroun in central Bohemia has been named the Czech Republic’s “historic town of the year” for 2009. The award goes for care of historical sites and comes with a cash prize of CZK 1 million (nearly USD 55,000). Accepting the honour at a ceremony at Prague Castle on Wednesday, Beroun’s mayor Jiří Besser thanked the team who had contributed to its rebirth after what he called “socialist devastation” and severe flooding in 2002. The runners-up spots in the competition went to Jilemnice and Uherské Hradiště.

Foreign Minister Jan Kohout has announced that both Saturday and Sunday will be days of national mourning in honor of Polish President Lech Kaczynski and other Polish officials killed in Saturday’s plane crash. Mr. Kohout said on Tuesday that Czech national flags on all official buildings will be drawn at half-mast and added that a minute of silence will be held on Saturday before noon. The government also encouraged mayors across the country to fly flags in their towns and cities at half-mast. Organizers of public, cultural and sports events should hold a minute of silence at the start of such events, Mr. Kohout said. Poland’s official mourning ceremony will be held in Warsaw on Saturday at noon. The funeral of the president and his wife will take place on Sunday in Krakow. Czech President Václav Klaus, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev will be in attendance, US President Barrack Obama’s attendance has not been confirmed by the White House yet.

The Civic Democrats have officially charged Petr Nečas with heading the party until the next party conference to be held after the May general elections. At a meeting of the party’s executive council on Tuesday, the former party leader Mírek Topolánek failed to have two other senior members of the party, election campaign manager Ivan Langer and Prague mayor Pavel Bém, removed from the party’s list of candidates. Both have received negative publicity in connection with possible links to organized crime. Mr. Langer said on Tuesday that the party’s difficult pre-election period had ended and that a hot new election campaign would start this Thursday. Mr. Topolánek was forced to step down from his post in March, after he alienated party members with scandalous remarks made during an interview.

The supervising board of Czech Airlines has approved a plan meant to restructure the company over the next three years. A spokeswoman for Czech Airlines said on Tuesday that the company would undergo an organizational shake-up and would gradually change into a holding company. The new restructuring plan is now pending approval of the Ministry of Finance and will be discussed by the Czech government in late April. The European Commission is currently investigating if a loan of 2.5 billion Czech crowns given to Czech Airlines by the state company Osinek was a form of illegal state aid.