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The Czech Republic plans to sign an agreement with the United States, outlining conditions for future visa-free relations between the two countries, despite EU pressure on Prague not to do so. The Czech deputy PM for European affairs, Alexandr Vondra, told journalists on Monday that Prague was not negotiating behind the EU’s back, but that simply waiting for further developments was not a way forward, in his opinion. Brussels is trying to persuade the Czech Republic to at least delay signing an accord with the US on entering into its visa-waiver programme. Some EU countries are worried that US demands within the agreement infringe data protection laws. It is feared that if the Czech Republic signs an agreement, then there will be increased pressure upon other EU members to follow suit.

The chairwoman of the Czech Supreme Court, Iva Brožová, has filed a lawsuit against her deputy, Pavel Kučera, over his controversial involvement in the prosecution of former deputy PM Jiří Čunek. Mr Kučera stands accused of exerting pressure upon state attorneys dealing with Mr Čunek’s case to put a halt to proceedings. Mr Kučera has denied all charges. A spokesperson for the Supreme Court said that at this stage no further information would be divulged so as to observe Mr Kučera’s presumption of innocence, and so as not to influence the panel of judges dealing with his case. Mr Kučera is accused of meeting the regional state attorney in Ostrava in a bid to influence the investigation into whether the head of the Christian Democrats, Mr Čunek, accepted a half-a-million-crown bribe in 2002.

The parents of two baby girls who were swapped at birth in a Třebíč maternity ward have been unable to agree with the hospital concerned on damages and are taking the matter to court. Each set of parents has demanded 12 million CZK (nearly 700,000 USD) from the hospital, while it says it is willing to give the parents 1 million CZK (58,000 USD) each. The hospital’s lawyer says that no long term psychological damage had been caused by the mix-up, and thus the hospital could not consider handing out such a high amount. The parents are asking for 1 million crowns for each month they were separated from their own biological child. Veronika and Nikolka were swapped back only days before their first birthdays on December 9 last year.

The opposition Social Democrats have launched what they call a ‘battle’ to stop their deputies switching allegiance to other parties. Three Social Democrat MPs have defected to the ruling Civic Democratic Party since the elections. On Tuesday, the head of the Social Democrats, Jiří Paroubek, pledged that his party would not try and entice deputies from other political parties to defect, he asked the other parties in the Czech parliament to pledge the same thing. He said that enticing MPs to switch allegiance was ‘undemocratic’. It remains unlikely that the other parties in the Czech parliament will enter into the proposed pact.