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Political analysts are characterizing the elections to the Czech Senate as mainly a win for the country's ruling coalition. Experts contacted by the Czech News Agency suggested in the past Senate elections had often seen protest votes, which they said had not been the case this time around. The ruling centre-left coalition of the Social Democrats, ANO and the Christian Democrats won enough seats to secure a comfortable majority in the upper chamber of Parliament. The STEM polling agency's Jan Hartl called the results a 'positive signal' for the government. At the same time, the election saw a record-low turnout by voters, leading some to again question the necessity of the upper house. The big loser in the Senate election, political analysts suggest, is the right-of-centre party TOP 09, which failed to win a single seat in four races in the second round.

Three parties in the country's centre-left coalition won 18 out of 27 seats up for grabs in the Senate elections. The coalition will enjoy a majority of 46 in the 81-member upper chamber of Parliament. The Social Democrats clinched 10 seats, the ANO movement four, and the Christian Democrats four. All the same, the position of the Social Democrats weakened: until now, the leftist party had dominated the Senate, they now have 35 seats overall.

The opposition Civic Democrats, Mayors and Independents (STAN) and the Greens won two seats each. The small Party of Citizens´ Rights and the Party of Entrepreneurs won one seat each.

The vote turnout was a record low, below 17 percent.

Notable personalities who won their senate race include the former rector of Charles University Václav Hampl, the founder of the Our Child Foundation Zuzana Baudyšová, the Minister for Human Rights Jiří Dienstbier, and lottery firm billionaire Ivo Valenta.

Pyrotechnics experts are hoping on Saturday to begin searching through a munitions depot which was destroyed by an explosion on Thursday. Because of the danger of additional explosions, an armored vehicle and a special firefighters' 'tank' will be used at the site in the village of Vrbětice in South Moravia. Two people have been missing since the blast and are feared dead.

The Czech military is low on munitions, Czech daily Lidové noviny reports. According to the daily, the army would be hard-pressed to find enough ammunition to last for even 30 days of ground operations. Other munitions, such as missiles for the Čáslav Gripen squadron, are also insufficient and the military lacks cartridges for the mortar turrets of its Pandur armoured personnel carriers and tank guns, the newspaper writes. The same is true of the rapid response force that will be sent by the Czech Republic to help an allied country if attacked. Defence Ministry spokesman Jiří Čaletka is quoted as saying that 1.24 billion crowns had been allotted this year to acquire ammunition, with 203 million to be spent in 2015.