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Czech downhill skiers scored a sensational victory in the World Cup Nations Teams event in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany, on Sunday. The event involved four skiers from each nation, competing individually in parallel slalom. The Czech team, with Šárka Záhrobská, Lucie Hrstková, Ondřej Bank and Kryštof Krýzl, beat the United States, France and Austria to reach the finals. There the Czechs were tied 2-2 with Switzerland, but Ondřej Bank, undefeated in the previous heats, posted the fastest time to break the tie and secure the title.

Social Democrats unveiled their programme for the upcoming general elections at a party conference in Teplice, northern Bohemia on Saturday. Party leader Jiří Paroubek told the convention that if they win at the polls in May, they will make the Czech Republic one of top ten EU countries with the highest living standards. Mr Paroubek said his government would raise corporate taxes and taxes for the rich, and abolish fees for visits to the doctor, introduced last year as part of a health-care reform. The Social Democrat leader also promised to pay one-time extra pensions. The party would like to lower the deficit of the state budget and adopt the euro by 2016.

The election for the lower house of the Czech parliament is scheduled for May 28 and 29. The Social Democrats are leading in most polls, followed by the right-of-centre Civic Democrats, the conservative party TOP 09 and Communists. Some polls suggest that Christian Democrats and the Greens would also pass the five-percent threshold to enter the lower house.

Several dozen environmental activists protested a Social Democrat conference in Teplice on Saturday over the party’s stance on coal mining in the region. The protesters put up a sign on the building where the conference is taking place, while others gathered outside. The environmentalists would like the Social Democrats to reject further coal mining in the area. However, the party says that a regional referendum should determine whether coal mining limits, imposed by the government in the early 1990s, should be lifted. This would lead to the destruction of several villages in the region that are located on large brown coal deposits. During the communist era, dozens of villages and towns in northern Bohemia were destroyed to make way for coal mining.

The Czech health minister, Dana Jurásková, promised young doctors higher salaries at a meeting in Prague on Saturday. Ms Jurásková, met with around 300 doctors, faculty staff and other experts, who complained that after graduating from medical schools, while preparing for professional exams, they only receive part time contracts. They said however that because of staff shortages, they often put in regular hours, for which receive no salary. Minister Jurásková said she would change the respective legislation to prevent such practices in the future.