Brdy Hills to become protected nature reserve

The Brdy Hills, an area southwest of Prague,that has long served as military training grounds is to be turned into a protected nature reserve. Defense Minister Alexander Vondra and Environment Minister Tomas Chalupa on Thursday met with the mayors of the surrounding towns and villages to discuss plans for the future in view of the military’s planned withdrawal from the area. The ministry intends to withdraw from Brdy by 2015 partly due to cost cutting measures. It is also scrapping or reducing other military training grounds considered unnecessarily large. The Brdy Nature Reserve is to be larger than the present training grounds, linking up to adjacent reserves.