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11/07/2006
The Czech military police contingent which has spent three years training Iraqi police officers near Basra in the south of the country, has completed its mission and handed over the training centre to the local authorities. The 100-member strong military contingent was sent to Iraq shortly after the fall of Saddam Hussein and in the course of the past three years has trained over 12,000 Iraqis for the local police force as well as a team of instructors to eventually take over their work. The Czech Parliament is now debating the possibility of extending the contingent's mission in Iraq but the outcome will depend on whether the British contingent whose base it has been using will remain in place. For the time being the Czechs have been stationed elsewhere.
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11/06/2006
The leader of the Civic Democrats, Mirek Topolanek, who resigned as prime minister last month is to be reappointed into the post. President Vaclav Klaus surprised many with the announcement at a special press conference on Monday. Mr Topolanek handed in his resignation after his cabinet failed to get a vote of confidence in the lower house of Parliament. He is to be given a second chance to form a new government, the President said, adding that he no longer insists it have a majority in the lower house. Mr Topolanek himself says whether or not he should accept the offer will be decided during a party leadership meeting on Tuesday.
Since the general elections in June ended in political stalemate the five parliamentary parties have not been able to agree on a new government. President Klaus said the leader of the second strongest party, Social Democrat Jiri Paroubek, was to blame and has called off a planned meeting with leaders of the five parliamentary parties, which was to be held on Tuesday.
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11/06/2006
Social Democrat leader Jiri Paroubek says he is prepared to negotiate with the Civic Democrats if their leader Mirek Topolanek is entrusted with the task of forming a new government. During a special press conference on Monday evening, for which Mr Paroubek cut short his vacation, he said the Social Democrats are willing to come to a compromise and tone down demands in terms of a policy programme and important posts. Mr Paroubek, whose party came second in the elections in June, strongly rejected any responsibility for the country's political deadlock.
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11/06/2006
Three Romany organisations have written to Pope Benedict XVI asking him to intervene in a case in which Roma rent defaulters have been forced out of the town of Vsetin by the mayor, Jiri Cunek. Vaclav Miko of the group Roma Realia Dobromerice said Czechs and Czech Christians needed to be alerted to the fact that Mr Cunek's actions were a "sin".
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11/06/2006
Members of the environmental organisation Greenpeace blocked the main entrance to the Environment Ministry on Monday. The activists were protesting at a ministry proposal to give firms permission to release 102 million tonnes of carbon dioxide in the years between 2008 and 2012. On wooden planks nailed across the entrance the activists wrote "closed for inactivity" and "not protecting the climate but polluters". Four protesters were arrested by the police who needed three hours to unblock the entrance to the ministry.
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11/06/2006
The rate of corruption in the Czech Republic has declined but the country still ranks among the worst in the EU. This, according to a new Transparency International report that evaluated how the situation has changed in 163 countries in the last year. The Czech Republic figures among more than ten countries where the corruption index has improved the most. In 2005, the Czech Republic ended 47th, with 4.3 points on a ten-point scale, where 10 is the best showing, along with Namibia, Slovakia and Greece. In this year's report it finished 46th with 4.8 points, along with Kuwait and Lithuania.
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11/06/2006
Up to a third of the Czech Republic's butchers could go out of business, the head of the Czech meat processors union, Jaromir Klouda, said in an interview for Lidove noviny. Czech butchers have until the end of 2009 to meet European Union standards for preparing meat. Mr Klouda said for small butchers adapting their workplaces it would involve difficult building work and could be prohibitively expensive.
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11/06/2006
Czechs are one of the most optimistic nations when asked about employment opportunities, a European public opinion poll suggests. Results of a new Eurobarometer survey indicate that 56 percent of Czechs believe they will be employed in two years' time. In the 25 EU member states, the Czech Republic ranked 8th when it came to optimism. Citizens of neighbouring Slovakia and Poland on the other hand appear to be much more pessimistic; a mere 29 percent of each population think they will hold a full-time job in 2008.
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11/06/2006
Dutch retail giant Ahold intends to close down its supermarkets in Slovakia and Poland to concentrate on the Czech market. Ahold operates the Albert and Hypernova supermarkets and posted a turnover of 36 billion crowns (an estimated 1.6 billion US dollars) in the Czech Republic last year.
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11/05/2006
President Vaclav Klaus is disappointed by the fact the Social Democrats have rejected a plan he put forward as a way out of the ongoing political crisis, the president's spokesman told the website Novinky. Mr Klaus on Friday proposed a "rainbow" coalition which would lead to early elections; within hours, however, the Social Democrats said they would not take part.
The party, who came second in elections in June, have also reiterated their call to be given a chance to form the next government, after the winning Civic Democrats failed to put together a viable government.
The leaders of the five parties in the lower house are due to hold more talks with Mr Klaus on Tuesday. It is believed that if they cannot agree on a solution before then, the president may himself choose a new prime minister.
The Czech Republic has been without a stable government since June, when general elections ended in stalemate.
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