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06/11/2005
The Czech Communist party is against the ratification of the EU Constitution in its present form. A meeting of the party's executive committee concluded that following the French and Dutch rejections of the treaty and Britain's decision to shelve its referendum, continuing with plans for ratification was no longer meaningful. The other opposition party on the Czech political scene, the right wing Civic Democrats, have expressed a similar opinion, saying that the treaty was dead and there was no point in wasting time and money on it.
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06/11/2005
Meanwhile, the Czech Prime Minister Jiri Paroubek has called on European Union leaders to send a strong signal to voters in the Czech Republic which would renew trust in the Constitution and the EU integration process in general. Speaking at a Visegrad group summit in Warsaw, the Czech Prime Minister said the upcoming EU summit in Brussels could have a significant impact on the situation in the Czech Republic, where Euro-scepticism has been on the rise since the French and Dutch rejections of the treaty. Prime Minister Paroubek had been in favour of forging ahead with an information campaign on the EU Constitution, but after consulting with his coalition partners he agreed to shelve that decision pending the outcome of the EU summit in Brussels.
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06/11/2005
A new witness has appeared in the Koristka bribery case in which the governing coalition accused the opposition of trying to bribe one of the coalition's MPs with the intention of bringing down the government. The case was recently shelved for lack of evidence. Ladislav Sommer, a 58 year old former journalist and writer, has now come forward to say that while sitting in a café in Ostrava he had overheard two men offering Freedom Union deputy Zdenek Koristka 10 million crowns and a promising career in exchange for voting against the coalition government in a planned no-confidence vote. He said he could identify the two men as Vecerek and Dalik, a lobbyist and adviser to the opposition Civic Democrats. The Civic Democrats say this is a smear campaign against them and point out that if this were true Sommer should have come forward while the case was still open. Police are investigating the claims.
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06/11/2005
A fifteen year old girl was seriously injured on a mountain climbing expedition when she fell from a 25 meter slope onto rocky terrain. According to the CTK news agency she was flown to hospital with spinal injuries and internal bleeding.
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06/11/2005
Some 7,000 people marched through Prague on Saturday in support of a cancer prevention campaign. The campaign concerns breast cancer and is an attempt to get more information to the public and persuade more women to undergo regular screening.
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06/10/2005
The prime ministers of the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia, or the so-called Visegrad countries, have agreed that the EU Constitution ratification process should continue, even after French and Dutch voters rejected it, the Polish Prime Minister Marek Belka said on Friday at a Visegrad Group summit in Poland, which has been dominated by EU integration. Referring to next week's EU summit, the Czech Prime Minister Jiri Paroubek said the Czech Republic was waiting for a signal from the European Council, which would have an important effect on the ratification process in the Czech Republic. The prime ministers also agreed they wanted EU member states to agree on the European Union's budget for 2007-2013 at next week's summit in Brussels. Radio Prague's Martina Lustigova reports from the Visegrad summit.
"The prime ministers talked also about the growth of the budget of the Visegrad Fund. Currently, the budget is 3 million euros and in the future each country should pay 50,000 euros more. The Visegrad Fund should concentrate on new projects. Currently the fund supports mainly cultural activities, cooperation of schools, a number of festivals or translations of books. In the future, the Visegrad Fund should also help other countries, for example, last year the Visegrad Fund sent its observers to Ukraine for the elections."
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06/10/2005
The Foreign Minister Cyril Svoboda's return from an official trip to Montenegro was delayed by an hour due to a defect on his plane. The door of the Soviet-made Antonov-26 would not shut and a device controlling air-pressure onboard was out of order, Minister Svoboda told the CTK news agency. However both defects were quickly repaired. Mr Svoboda had arrived in Serbia and Montenegro on Wednesday to discuss the future of the Balkans, including the status of the Kosovo province.
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06/10/2005
The number of foreigners living in the Czech Republic has been rising markedly in recent years. Some 250,000 foreign nationals stayed legally in the country at the end of last year, including nearly 100,000 foreigners with a permanent residence permit, the Interior Ministry announced on Friday. According to the ministry's asylum and migration policy department the number of foreigners rose by almost 19,000 last year compared to 2003. According to the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the Czech Republic has become a country with the steepest increase in the number of foreigners in the world between 1992 and 2002.
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06/10/2005
The US Embassy in Prague has confirmed that a new location for the headquarters of the US-funded radio station Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty has been found in Prague. In an interview for the daily Mlada Fronta Dnes, Prime Minister Jiri Paroubek said the station's management had chosen a new location but it was up to them when they would make it public. Currently, the station is located in the centre of Prague. Relocation for security reasons has been planned since the events of September 11, 2001.
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06/10/2005
Tuesday June 14th will be tax freedom day in the Czech Republic, two days earlier than in 2004, the Liberal Institute think tank announced on Friday. According to Liberal Institute President, Jiri Schwarz, since 2000 tax freedom day has moved eight days forward, which means Czechs spend more time earning for the state. Some economists argue taxes in the Czech Republic are too high, making life difficult for businessmen and contributing to high unemployment.
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