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A second test by Brno hospital officials to determine whether a man who died of pneumonia over the weekend may have been infected with SARS - has failed to uncover any evidence of the deadly virus. The victim had been suspected of having the disease, after having recently travelled to the Czech Republic from Southeast Asia; he died in hospital on Saturday. An autopsy was first conducted to determine whether the man suffered from Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, or SARS, which has swept Asia and Canada, but so far has not been detected in the Czech Republic. In recent weeks Czech hospitals in the country's main cities have quarantined and examined some 26 people for the disease. None have tested positive so far.

Foreign Minister Cyril Svoboda has indicated he wants the National Security Office to increase the speed of vetting of candidates become members of the permanent Czech mission to the European Union. On Wednesday he requested the government give this task to the head of the National Security Office Tomas Kadlec. In Mr Svoboda's view vetting is clearly necessary with regards to the activities of diplomatic and non-diplomatic personnel, but after the government meeting on Wednesday he expressed dismay that 530 cases at the Foreign Ministry remain incomplete, 120 of those requests dating back to1999. Mr Svoboda wants the government to set specific deadlines for the vetting process. He stressed the importance of the procedure for completing the European agenda, as well as for the setting of Czech representation in Brussels.

The Czech Prime Minister Vladimir Spidla has expressed support for a common European defense and foreign policy. Addressing an audience at the Johan Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt Mr. Spidla said that while Europe had become an economic power, foreign policy and defense wise it was a midget. A European defense force should help to restore balance within the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the Czech Prime Minister said. He appealed for European unity pointing out that in the present day no European country was in a position to defend its interests alone.

Czech politicians, WWII veterans and Prague citizens, on Monday, gathered outside the Czech Radio building to commemorate the 1945 Prague Uprising. The commemorative ceremony was attended by Prime Minister Vladimir Spidla, deputy chairman of the Senate Premysl Sobotka, and the deputy mayor of Prague Petr Hulinsky, who laid wreaths in front of the Czech Radio Building and paid homage to the memory of those who lost their lives. The Prague Uprising began on May 5th, 1945 with a call to arms, broadcast on the radio. Around 30,000 people spontaneously joined the freedom fighters in the Czech capital.