• Lipavský: Foreign Ministry in contact with people seeking to exit Gaza
    11/05/2023

    The Czech Foreign Ministry is in contact with 11 people seeking to be evacuated from the Gaza Strip, Minister Jan Lipavský said on Sunday. He said on TV Nova that eight of the 11 were known to have Czech citizenship; Czech officials are attempting to find out more about the others.

    Egypt’s agreement is required for people to leave Gaza and granted permission to four people with Czech passports to leave in recent days. However it is unclear whether those concerned actually managed to leave Palestinian territory.
    Author: Ian Willoughby

  • Válek: Czech hospitals spend more of income on salaries than those in West
    11/05/2023

    The Czech minister of health, Vlastimil Válek, says that hospitals in Czechia spend up to 60 percent of their income on salaries, while in some areas such as aftercare, rehabilitation or psychiatric care it is 80 percent. In Western countries the figure is around 50 percent, Mr. Válek told a congress of the Czech Medical Chamber on Sunday.

    The president of the doctors’ group, Milan Kubek, said the amount of money that goes into health care, which is lower than in the West, pays for devices and medicines at the same prices, leaving less for staff remuneration.
    Author: Ian Willoughby

  • Parties agree to reallocate some funds in 2024 budget
    11/05/2023

    The parties in the Czech governing coalition have agreed to reallocate CZK 12 million in the 2024 state budget, Czech Television reported. Money should go to organisations commemorating Czech democratic traditions, such as the Czechoslovak Legionary Community and the Shoah Memorial, Czech TV said.

    MPs approved the basic parameters of the budget at the end of October, so they will no longer be able to touch the level of revenues, expenditures and the deficit. However, they still have the option of requesting transfers of money between chapters in the second reading.

    Finance Minister Zbyněk Stanjura said the smaller such changes were, the better.
    Author: Ian Willoughby

  • Weather forecast
    11/05/2023

    It should be mainly overcast in Czechia on Monday, with an average high temperature of 13 degrees Celsius. Similar weather is expected on the following days, though highs will fall slightly.

  • Seventy years since first game at Brno stadium that holds attendance record
    11/05/2023

    Sunday is the 70th anniversary of the first football game at the Za Lužánkami stadium in Brno. The venue holds the domestic league attendance record, 44,120, for a match between Brno and Slavia Prague.

    Today Za Lužánkami, which hosted its final game 22 years ago, is in disrepair and is faced with demolition.
    Author: Ian Willoughby

  • Kolya editor Alois Fišárek dies at 80
    11/05/2023

    Top Czech film editor Alois Fišárek, the winner of six Czech Lion national awards, has died at the age of 80. Mr. Fišárek worked on a number of successful films by director Jan Svěrák, including The Elementary School, Dark Blue World, Empties and the Oscar-winning Kolya.

    He also taught at Prague’s FAMU film school, where he headed the editing department, from 1968 to 2002.
    Author: Ian Willoughby

  • 3.25-magnitude tremor registered in Cheb area
    11/04/2023

    Seismographs in the Cheb area in West Bohemia recorded a 3.25-magnitude tremor on Saturday. It was the first time in a current wave of tremors in the area that the magnitude was higher than three.

    Tremors first appeared after a long time on Wednesday and previously the strongest was on Friday, when tremor of 2.6 on the Richter Scale was registered.
    Author: Ian Willoughby

  • PM Fiala opens Czech-Ethiopian Business Forum
    11/04/2023

    Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala opened a Czech-Ethiopian Business Forum in Addis Ababa on Saturday. In a speech, he said Czechia saw Ethiopia as one of its key trading partners in Africa and that there was great potential for further cooperation in such areas as the health sector and the defence industry.

    Mr. Fiala also said Ethiopia was an important country in terms of stability in the East Africa region.

    Czech officials said 14 Czech businessmen and about 40 Ethiopian businessmen had participated in the forum.

    Prime Minister Fiala also met his Ethiopian counterpart, Abiy Ahmed, on the first full day of one a week-long visit to a number of African states.
    Author: Ian Willoughby

  • Krkonoše Mountains see 15 centimetres of snow
    11/04/2023

    Around 15 centimetres of snow fell on the ridges of the Krkonoše Mountains in the north of Czechia on Friday night. It was the first major snow of the season in the highest parts of the mountain range.

    Strong winds on Saturday forced the closure of a cable car from the town of Pec pod Sněžkou to Sněžka, the country’s highest peak. While it was minus 2.2 degrees Celsius on Sněžka the gales meant that the “real feel” was minus 12 degrees Celsius.
    Author: Ian Willoughby

  • No prosecution for kebab shop anti-Semitic sign
    11/04/2023

    A 35-year-old foreigner will not be prosecuted after putting up anti-Semitic signs in his kebab shop in Plzeň, following a decision of the State Prosecutor’s Office. The police had been investigating the Turkish man on suspicion of hate speech, but a local state prosecutor said there was no evidence of any crime.

    The head of the Plzeň Jewish Community told reporters that the move was not a good signal, saying that prosecution could have deterred others from making similar statements.
    Author: Ian Willoughby

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