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05/02/2008
The opposition Social Democrats have presented two proposals for the abolition of medical fees, which were introduced as part of the government’s health system reform. The first proposal suggests complete abolition of health care fees while the other, compromise proposal, would exempt only certain groups from paying the fees, including children under the age of 18, pensioners without income and disabled people. The two smaller parties in the ruling coalition, the Christian Democrats and the Greens, have also expressed disagreement with some of the newly introduced fees. The Czech Parliament’s lower house should discuss the proposals in June.
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05/02/2008
Around one hundred people gathered at the National cemetery in Terezín, north of Prague, to commemorate the victims of the last execution carried out in the Gestapo-run in Terezín’s Little Fortress in 1945. The 51 members of various resistance groups were executed 63 years ago in the Gestapo prison in what was the largest execution in the history of Terezín. More than 150,000 people passed through the Terezín ghetto between 1941 and 1945 and some 35,000 people died there. The rest were sent on to Nazi camps in the east, where most of them perished. After the war, Terezín’s Little Fortress was turned into a wartime memorial.
Over 800 bronze name plates bearing the names of wartime victims were recently stolen from the gravestones at the national cemetery in Terezín and were later found to have been sold as scrap metal. The damage that the Holocaust memorial suffered is thought to have run into millions of crowns, all of the bronze plates were found broken into pieces. The memorial hopes to replace the name plates by May 18, the day commemorating the victims of Nazi persecution.
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05/02/2008
Memorial ceremonies have got underway in the west Bohemian city of Pilsen to mark the end of the Second World War and the liberation of the city by US troops on May 6, 1945. As every year, a number of Second World War veterans from the US and Belgium have accepted the invitation to attend the celebrations as guests of honour and the coming days are full of events, including a military parade, a veterans-car ride and an air show organized by the Czech Airforce.
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05/02/2008
Several free techno music festivals are currently being held over the country. Some 2,000 people attended a rave in south Bohemian village of Uzenice which got underway on Thursday and more visitors are expected to arrive at the weekend. The techno festival is being held with an approval from the local town hall. Other parties are being held in Opava and Sokolov. Techno festivals have been closely observed since 2005, when the police dispersed thousands of techno fans with tear gas and water canons at an illegal CzechTek festival in South Bohemia.
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05/01/2008
A Czech soldier was killed in Afghanistan on Wednesday. He died in hospital after a roadside bombing which wounded four other Czech soldiers, one of them seriously. The troops, who were travelling in a Humvee military vehicle when the attack occurred, were serving with a Czech Provincial Reconstruction Team in the province of Logar, south-east of Kabul. In March a military policeman became the first Czech combat casualty of the modern era when he was killed in a suicide attack in Helmand province. Last year another Czech soldier died in Afghanistan in an accident caused by flooding.
Before news of Wednesday’s attack, the lower house of the Czech parliament voted to send more troops to Afghanistan. Around 100 members of a special forces unit are to be sent to the war-torn state. That comes on top of a deployment of over 400 Czech soldiers approved last year.
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05/01/2008
A number of May Day events were held in the Czech Republic on Thursday, which was a state holiday. Left-wing political parties the Communists and the Social Democrats held rallies to mark the workers’ holiday. Far-right groups and anarchists also held gatherings. In Brno police confiscated hammer and sickle flags from the Young Communists, who are outlawed. No disturbances were reported at any of the gatherings.
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05/01/2008
A 27-year-old man died after apparently setting himself on fire at a traditional čarodějnice (witch-burning) celebration in the village of Vesce in south Moravia. Revellers spotted the man on fire near the bonfire at the centre of the celebration, and attempted to douse the flames. However, he died on the scene of third degree burns. Police said the man’s clothes smelled of petrol and that it appeared to be a case of suicide.
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05/01/2008
A Czech Army military parade in Prague in October marking the 90th anniversary of the foundation of Czechoslovakia will also feature Slovak and French troops, the Czech Ministry of Defence has announced. Czech fire and police officers will also participate in the one-hour parade, which is set to take place at Prague Castle on October 28. Soviet style large-scale military inspections began in Czechoslovakia in the 1950s, though the Czech Army pointed out that parades were also held in the inter-war period known as the First Republic. This year’s event will be a one-off.
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05/01/2008
The Czech football star Pavel Nedvěd is to announce next week whether he is willing to return to the national team for the European Championship in Switzerland and Austria. The midfielder’s Italian agent told a Czech newspaper that the player should be given time and space to make his decision calmly. Nedvěd, who turns 36 in August, retired from international football after the 2006 World Cup. He scored 18 goals in 91 games for the Czech Republic.
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05/01/2008
The Czech international football goalkeeper Petr Čech has reached the final of the Champions League with his club Chelsea. Čech made a couple of fine saves but also conceded one soft goal in Chelsea’s 3:2 win over Liverpool on Wednesday night, a result which gave the Blues a 4:3 win on aggregate. Three years ago Milan Baroš and Vladimír Šmicer became the first Czechs to win club football’s most prestigious competition with Liverpool. Last year AC Milan’s Marek Jankulovski became the third.
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