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The Chamber of Deputies has approved a special mandate preventing the government from transferring national powers to the European Union without the consent of the Czech Parliament. Senators from the right-of-centre Civic Democrats say they will only vote to ratify the EU’s Lisbon treaty if such a guarantee is in place. The matter will now go before the Senate, though it is unclear whether a vote on the mandate would take place at the same time as the actual vote on Lisbon.

The renowned Czech writer Milan Kundera is set to bring out a new collection of essays next week. In Une rencontre the author, best known for titles such as The Unbearable Lightness of Being, turns his attention to greats of world culture such as Francis Bacon, Dostoevsky and Rabelais. Kundera has been publishing in French since 1990, a decade and a half after he moved to Paris from Czechoslovakia. He turns 80 on April 1.

Prime Minister Mirek Topolánek told Parliament on Wednesday he had proof that last year’s presidential elections were manipulated by people close to the opposition Social Democrats. The prime minister said that the people behind the manipulation were the former head of the intelligence service Karel Randák and Petr Dimun, who is currently head of PR in the Social Democratic Party. Mr. Topolánek said he was prepared to submit the evidence at a closed session of the lower house.

President Vaclav Klaus won a second term in office in last year’s presidential elections, beating challenger Jan Švejnar, a liberal economist backed by the Social Democrats and the Greens. At the time, the coalition and opposition accused each other of arm-twisting and underhand practices. Several deputies and senators received anonymous threats in the mail and a Social Democrat MP was expelled from his deputies’ group for voting with the other side. President Klaus on Wednesday refused to comment on the prime minister’s remarks.

During talks in Berlin on Wednesday, Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg stressed the importance of the EU’s Eastern Partnership Programme to be launched in May. Addressing members of the Bundestag’s Foreign Relations Committee Mr. Schwarzenberg said it was important that the EU establish a working relationship with the former Soviet Republics in order to motivate them on the road to democracy. The Eastern Partnership Programme is a forum intended to facilitate visa agreements, free trade deals and strategic partnership agreements with a number of countries from Eastern Europe and the South Caucasus. It does not imply future membership of the European Union. The partnership scheme will include Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine and Belarus.