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The 28th edition of the Ji.hlava International Documentary Film Festival starts today in the Vysočina town. The ten-day festival will offer visitors 340 films, many of them world premieres. The festival opens with the world premiere of the documentary "The President", which charts the five-year tenure of the former Slovak head of state Zuzana Čaputová. The highly anticipated film will be screened four times during the festival.

A heated debate over politicians’ salaries in the Czech Chamber of Deputies stretched into the night hours on Thursday but the chamber failed to vote on a proposal by the opposition to freeze politicians salaries for five years at a time of austerity measures and tax hikes. The governing parties, which have supported a 6.9 increase in politicians‘ salaries in 2025, argued that the hike corresponds to the growth in average wages and accused the opposition of trying to rake up points ahead of next year’s general elections.

Talks between Czech Health Minister Vlastimil Válek and doctors unions will continue for a second day on Friday with the aim of averting a planned two-day strike by GPs and outpatient specialists next week.  If the negotiations fail GPs offices around the country will close on Tuesday and Wednesday leaving patients no option but to seek emergency care in hospitals. The protest is against the healthcare funding decree for 2025, which doctors say fails to take into account rising costs.

Psychiatrist Džamila Stehlíková need not apologize for her remarks about the health of former president Miloš Zeman during his hospitalization in October of 2021, the Municipal Court of Appeal ruled on Thursday.  Assessing media footage of the then-president, Stehlíková expressed the view that the president's abstinence in the hospital had led to the onset of delirium tremens, among other things, and indirectly questioned his ability to perform his duties. The judge concluded that Stehlíková had proven the veracity of her judgments and that as an expert she had sufficient publicly available sources of information to assess Zeman's condition at the time. The judge also stressed that as a public figure  Zeman had to accept the fact that he was under public scrutiny. In addition to an apology, Zeman had also demanded CZK 1 million for the Fund for Children at Risk, which was also rejected by the court.