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The Civic Democratic Party, led by Prime Minister Mirek Topolánek, has distanced itself from two of its MPs – Jan Morava and Vlastimil Tlustý – in a breaking scandal. The party has subsequently called on both to give up their posts. Journalists have revealed that 29-year-old Jan Morava allegedly spent months plotting against fellow MPs – most notably rebel figures within the ruling coalition – for political purposes. Green Party MP Olga Zubová was the main figure targeted, TV Nova and Mladá fronta Dnes have reported. Mr Morava allegedly had her daughter monitored and secretly photographed to try and create material to scare and blackmail the rebel MP into voting well within coalition lines. Mr Morava expressed an interest, also, in attaining compromising material on others, journalists reported.

The Czech Republic and the United States have agreed on the final formulation of the Status of Forces Agreement or SOFA treaty - defining the conditions for US troops who will serve at a proposed US radar base on Czech territory. The Czech government is to deal with the treaty within two week’s time. A team of US specialists had been in the Czech Republic to continue negotiations, the Czech Defence Ministry said. On Friday the ministry revealed that only minor details, such as proofreading, now remained. The contents of the final text have not been released. The main treaty on the US radar base was signed back in July and will now have to be ratified by the country’s parliament.

An increasingly wealthy and confident Russia has been testing the West with its invasion of Georgia and it is likely there will be more such crises in the region, Deputy Foreign Minister Tomáš Pojar has said. On Friday. Mr Pojar met with senior US officials in Washington this week to discuss plans for a US radar base in the Czech Republic. Reuters reported that in an interview with reporters at the United Nations, Mr Pojar outlined that the Czech Republic did not think that the Russian invasion of Georgia was the last crisis that would pit the new bolder Russia against the West. Some analysts have suggested that the Crimea region in southern Ukraine could be used by Russia to destabilize the country. The region hosts Russia's Black Sea fleet in the port of Sevastopol, and the majority of people living there are ethnic Russians.

Around 800 people in Toronto, Canada on Friday paid their final respects to the late Thomas J. Baťa, who died this week at the age of 93. Mr Baťa, born in Zlín in what is today’s Czech Republic, made Canada his permanent home after the Communists seized power in Czechoslovakia in 1948. He oversaw a shoe-manufacturing empire that was first founded by his father. Attendees at the funeral service on Friday included not only family and friends but also political figures such as the Czech Deputy Prime Minister Jiří Čunek and the former premier of Ontario, Bob Rae.