News

More than a third of the Czech Republic is currently suffering from drought, Environment Minister Richard Brabec told journalists after meeting with local Central Bohemian mayors in Prague. Despite 2019 seeing more rain than in previous years, it is not enough to counteract six years of drought which the country has gone through. Unless 2020 sees above average rainfall, it is very unlikely that the accumulated groundwater deficit will be eliminated, the Environment Minister said.

Some CZK 12 billion have been allocated from state budgets between 2014 to 2020 to combat the effects of drought, 2 billion of which remain in the reserve.

Prime Minister Andrej Babiš’s ANO party maintained its lead in the polls in November, according to a newly published STEM agency survey. ANO received 34.9 percent of voter preference, leaving the second placed Pirate Party trailing far behind with 10.9 percent. The third placed Civic Democrats would receive 10.6 percent of the vote according to STEM, followed by the Freedom and Direct Democracy Party with 9.1 percent of preferences. The Mayors and Independents and the Communist Party both received just over 7 percent, while the Social Democrats, who are currently in government with ANO would get 6.4 percent. The last party to cross the required 5 percent threshold to get into the lower house of Parliament are the Christian Democrats with 5.5 percent. TOP 09, which currently sits in the Chamber of Deputies would receive just 3.7 percent.

According to the Czech News Agency, the survey was carried out after the November 17 protests against the prime minister, but before last week, when he was both found to be in a conflict of interest by a European Commission audit and criminal charges for subsidy fraud were restarted against him.

Both the Police and Interior Minister Jan Hamáček have denied that there were any attempts to make Prague City Hall begin with the testing of test facial recognition technology in surveillance cameras. Their statements were made after Czech Radio’s online news site iRozhlas acquired a letter sent in September by the Regional Police Directorate to City Hall, which talked about facial recognition testing in specific areas, including Prague Airport and strategic metro and railway stations.

According to the interior minister the whole issue has been inflated and the police issued no demands, but simply voiced their suggestions with intent to start a debate. However, iRozhlas has pointed to the fact that the Police Deputy for External Service Petr Matějíček writes twice asking “for a pilot project to verify the functionality of face recognition cameras in selected locations of the city”.

Prague City Hall councillors have indicated they will not allow the police to activate automatic facial recognition cameras in the city.

The state is set to collect CZK 1.6 billion from Prague Airport this year. The Chairman of the Board of Directors Václav Řehoř told Czech Radio that this was a logical consequence of the economic results of the airport which have been developing “above expectations“. He said that extraordinary revenues, such as the sales of air craft, played a role in the increased profits. Last year, the state collected only CZK 350 million, while in 2017 it was CZK 2.5 billion.

The airport is planning to invest tens of billions of crowns in the next few years. This will include a CZK 16 billion expansion of its second terminal, as well as a new parallel runway.