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The opposition right-of-centre Civic Democrats have called for a special meeting of the lower house of parliament to discuss its proposed restitution bill. Put forward in July, the bill pushes back the deadline by which people, who have a right to ask the state to return their property, make their claims. They currently only have until the end of the year. The Civic Democrats, who propose to push the deadline back to December 2009, argue the current law gives those affected little time to make their case and no chance to apply for compensation.

Deputy health minister David Rath has said that the largest state-owned health insurance company, VZP, will not face forced administration for now. The deputy health minister, as well as health minister candidate, met with VZP head Jirina Musilkova on Monday to discuss money-saving steps. The VZP's debt is more than 10 billion crowns (approx. 403,000,000 US dollars) and may grow by 2 more billion crowns by the end of the year unless saving measures are adopted immediately. Mr Rath said that the funds should be saved by a slower increase in payments to hospitals. Saved funds will be sent to smaller private facilities sooner. Mr Rath expects savings in expenses for medicine as well.

Mr Rath and the VZP's Musilkova have planned to meet again next week. Later this week Mr Rath will meet with hospital heads and representatives from both health insurance companies and health care providers.

President Vaclav Klaus has said he was misled by Prime Minister Jiri Paroubek when Mr Paroubek was first named to the government last year as Minister for Local Development. At the weekend the Prime Minister admitted in the media he had been in conflict of interest on at least three counts at the time of his naming. He made the statement apparently to show it hadn't bothered the president at the time. But, Vaclav Klaus responded through a spokesman on Monday by saying he had been misled. According to the spokesman Mr Paroubek - in an official statement - made no mention of any additional activities breaching conflict of interest.

Former president of the Sparta Prague football club, Petr Mach, has been cleared of criminal charges by a Prague court. The prosecution had been trying to find Mr Mach guilty of fraud for failing to pay back a 160 million crown bank loan, but could not pin the charge on the defendant, found guilty in an earlier ruling later that was later struck down by the high court. The prosecution has appealed the ruling.