News

About a dozen Czech rock bands took to the stage on Sunday afternoon to play a benefit concert for the "We don't talk to Communists" group, which wants to prevent politicians from working with the unreformed party. Among the bands playing are the rap-metal group Cocotte Minute, the Romani band Gluo Car and the pop-rock combo Chinaski. Several avant-garde theatre groups including Divadlo Continuo and Teatr Novogo Fronta were also staging productions at the event, which took place in an abandoned factory in Prague's Karlin district. The first "We don't talk to communists" concert was first performed last year, on November 17, the anniversary of the intervention by communist police in 1989 against a peaceful students' demonstration in Prague, which led to the so-called Velvet Revolution.

After talks with state ombudsman Otakar Motejl, Health Minister Milada Emmerova has agreed to establish a special commission to investigate fresh allegations that Romani women were sterilised without their consent in the past decade. The birth rate among the Roma is significantly higher than the general population and documented evidence shows that from 1959 to 1990 the former Czechoslovakia encouraged Romani women to undergo sterilisation by giving them cash payments, and in some cases doctors performed the operation without the women's consent. The practice was condemned by international human rights groups as racist and halted as official policy. Charges that sterilizations continued in recent years have been brought forth by the Budapest-based European Roma Rights Centre, along with two Czech civil society groups which are representing the legal interests of about 10 Romani women.

Two Czech test pilots have begun training on JAS-39 Gripen fighters in Sweden. The men will return home as pilot-instructors themselves in a few months time to begin training their Czech colleagues. The Czech government agreed to lease the Swedish jets for the next ten years. As of May 2005, the Czech air force will decommission the fleets Russian-made MIG-21s.

The Chamber of Deputies has approved the adoption of the European arrest warrant, overturning a veto by President Vaclav Klaus. Meanwhile, the opposition Civic Democrats said Friday they were planning to take the matter to the Constitutional Court; they say the European arrest warrant contravenes the Czech Republic's bill of basic rights and freedoms.