News

Prague authorities have announced the city is safe and as beautiful as ever in order to reassure foreign visitors who might be apprehensive because of the recent flood. According to the city's mayor Igor Nemec foreign media are still presenting what he termed "an apocalyptic image of Prague". The city is suffering major losses in tourism revenues as visitors are cancelling their stays. The city-hall has said the renewal of the flooded areas is progressing fast. On Wednesday Prague's 14th-century Charles Bridge reopened to the public and as of Thursday, boats will be cruising again on the river in the centre of Prague.

Greenpeace has included Spolana in its "Company Crimes" report presented at the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg. Greenpeace has expressed grave concern over the activities of Spolana, saying that the plant's management has withheld information on matters that posed a serious threat to the public. Greenpeace has repeatedly highlighted the danger of poisonous dioxins and an estimated 25,000 kilograms of poisonous mercury which are stored at Spolana.

The Czech Republic has come halfway down Transparency International's annual corruption perceptions index. The country came joint 52nd with Slovakia and Latvia, out of a total of 102 countries surveyed. Other post-Communist countries - including Poland and Hungary - were judged to be less corrupt, and came higher up the list. In first place was Finland, while Bangladesh and Nigeria came joint last.

The General Director of the Spolana chemical factory, Radomir Vek, has been sacked following two serious leaks of toxic chlorine gas and liquid chlorine at the flood-damaged plant, just 25 km north of Prague. The plant's board has decided to replace Mr Vek with the General Director of Chemopetrol, Miroslav Kuliha, as of Tuesday. A third degree chemical alert was called in the north Bohemian town of Neratovice and several nearby villages on Friday following an accident at Spolana in which several hundred kilograms of poisonous chlorine gas were released into the air. A Spolana representative later admitted to other flood related problems, saying that close to 80 tons of chlorine had leaked into the river Elbe when the plant was flooded.

Meanwhile, at the plant itself, Spolana's emergency committee decided on Monday to begin pumping out the remaining 12 -14 tons of chlorine, to be converted into non-toxic sodium chlorate. Since a further leak of the chlorine gas into the air cannot be ruled out, rescuers have been put on alert and evacuation buses are ready to transport residents to a secure area.