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06/07/2006
On Wednesday the Czech government approved over 441 million crowns ($20 million USD) to be put towards lowering the developing world's debt. Foreign Minister Cyril Svoboda made the announcement, saying that the money will be made available between 2007 and 2044, as part of the Multilateral Initiative for a Debt-free Developing World. The international project is coordinated by the Association for Development, which is an economic body that belongs to the World Bank group and runs projects targeting education and health issues in the developing world. Over 81 countries currently access monies from this fund.
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06/07/2006
President Klaus has signed a law re-classifying some food products into a lower tax bracket. Coffee, tea, and chocolate are among the goods that will now be taxed at the lower 5% rate, rather than the previous rate of 19%. According to food producers, the change in tax rates is likely to effect prices on store shelves, though the new prices are not likely to be discounted by the full 14% difference.
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06/07/2006
Organizers of the annual contest that determines the best Czech beer have announced that this year's contestants will include a total of 47 breweries from the Czech Republic and Slovakia, with 194 different brews in the running for the title. Now in its tenth year, the contest that awards the title Best Beer of the Czech Republic has attracted five more breweries than last year. The festivities begin in Ceske Budejovice, south Bohemia, on Thursday and run until Saturday.
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06/07/2006
Czech doubles player Kvetoslava Peschkeova and her Italian doubles partner, Francesca Schiavone have been defeated in the quarter finals of the French Open. They lost to the number-one-ranked team of Lisa Raymond and Samantha Stosur 6:7 (5:7), 6:0, 6:1.
Meanwhile, rising Czech tennis star Nicole Vaidisova awaits her first career grand slam semi-final match. She is scheduled to meet Svetlana Kuznetsova on the court at Roland Garros on Tuesday afternoon.
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06/06/2006
The winner of the weekend's general elections, the centre right Civic Democrats, are holding talks with the Christian Democratic Party and the Greens to try and set up a viable coalition government. The leaders of all three parties said on Tuesday there were no fundamental obstacles to forming a joint government and they would start work on the preparation of a coalition agreement. The talks are complicated because of the election stalemate in which the centre-right and centre-left each won 100 seats in the Lower House.
The leader of the Civic Democratic Party Mirek Topolanek has said he would try to form a viable government without betraying the party's policy programme. The stalemate in the Lower House means that the Civic Democratic Party will have to convince at least one member of the opposition - either the Social Democrats or the Communists to either leave the Chamber or support the new cabinet during the vote of confidence.
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06/06/2006
Newly elected MP for the Social Democrats Pavel Ploc says he has been offered a 5 million crown bribe to join the Green Party. Ploc, a former ski-jumper, said he had been approached by a former school mate whom he had not seen in years, with the offer of swapping parties and thus giving the emerging three party coalition the necessary extra vote needed to win a confidence vote in the Lower House. Ploc says he alerted the police and an investigation is underway.
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06/06/2006
Some members of the defeated Social Democratic Party are in favour of supporting a Civic Democrat-led government for a period of two years in exchange for a change of the election law from a proportional to majority system. Party chairman Jiri Paroubek told Lidove Noviny this was not the position of the party's executive committee. The two big parties -the Civic Democrats and the Social Democrats - have attempted to push through this change in the past but it was strongly opposed by the smaller parties in parliament whom it would effectively wipe out.
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06/06/2006
Some 2,000 people gathered on Prague's Wenceslas Square on Tuesday afternoon to protest against the continued presence of Jiri Paroubek - outgoing prime minister and head of the defeated Social Democrats - in Czech politics. The crowd was angered by the Prime Minister's bitter post-election speech in which he failed to accept his party's defeat, questioned the validity of the elections and called the elections "a defeat of democracy comparable to that in 1948 when the communists took over power in Czechoslovakia." The crowd chanted "enough of Paroubek", demanding his resignation from all political posts.
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06/06/2006
A Prague court has ruled in favour of extraditing a Swedish national of Lebanese origin, who is suspected of assisting terrorists, to the United States. Oussama Kassir was detained at Prague's Ruzyne Airport on the grounds of an international arrest warrant last December. He was on a stop-over flight from Stockholm to Beirut. Kassir is suspected of having provided terrorists with financial assistance. He could face up to 15 years in jail in the US.
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06/06/2006
President Vaclav Klaus has vetoed a bill which would have made it illegal to hold the post of mayor or governor simultaneously with that of MP or senator. The President said the proposed ban could destabilize local administration.
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