News

Czech President Petr Pavel has congratulated Peter Pellegrini on winning the second round of the Slovak presidential elections. Writing on social media site X, he said he believes their two countries "will continue the tradition of exceptionally good neighbourly relations" and that he looks forward to "constructive cooperation".

Peter Pellegrini will assume the office of president in June when the current Slovak president Zuzana Čaputová's mandate ends.

President Pavel is currently on a visit to Rwanda to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the Rwandan genocide.

Czechia appreciates Rwanda's willingness to provide asylum to refugees, President Petr Pavel stated after meeting with his Rwandan counterpart Paul Kagame in the Rwandan capital Kigali on Saturday. Rwanda signed an agreement with the United Kingdom in December last year whereby asylum seekers in the UK would be transferred to Rwanda while waiting for their asylum claims to be heard, an approach which Mr. Pavel described as "constructive" and "humanitarian" on the part of Rwanda.

The possibility of similar cooperation is now being considered in the European Union. Both statesmen agreed that migrants can have more dignified conditions in Rwanda than in inadequate refugee centres in overburdened European countries. Mr. Kagame stated that Rwanda is willing to accept migrants from foreign countries, but it needs money as it is a small nation without many resources to support refugees.

The UK-Rwanda Asylum Partnership Treaty has been criticised by the UN Refugee Agency, which said it is not compatible with international refugee law, and by human rights groups, who say Rwanda is not a safe country for refugees, as Kagame's rule is considered authoritarian and politically repressive.

A large number of runners in Saturday's Prague Half Marathon fainted, collapsed, or suffered other health problems due to the unusually hot April weather and the length of the race, the Czech News Agency reported. Temperatures in Prague had already exceeded 20 degrees Celsius by midday on Saturday. Paramedics treated dozens of people and some had to be taken to hospital. The emergency services were operating in crisis mode for about two hours, meaning rules around filling out documentation and other administrative tasks were relaxed to allow medical professionals to work faster and to make patient care more efficient.

Dangerous populist and extremist factions are gaining support and trying to get into power in Czechia, and it is the Mayors and Independents (STAN) party's job not to allow this to happen, Interior Minister and head of the party Vít Rakušan said in his opening speech at the STAN party assembly in Olomouc on Saturday. Mr. Rakušan emphasised the importance of showing the electorate the concrete results of what the government had achieved over the last two years, despite the crises of the war in Ukraine and the influx of refugees to Czechia, in order to show people that simple solutions don't work and that such promises by populists are empty. He added that the political situation in neighbouring countries serves as a warning for how quickly change can come.