President Klaus accuses French counterpart of playing a “game” over Czech-EU affairs

The war of words between the Czech and French presidents shows no sign of letting up. In comments made on Wednesday, Czech president Václav Klaus accused the French president Nicolas Sarkozy of playing a “dumb game” with the Czech Republic over EU matters. The comments came as a response to an earlier statement by the French president expressing regret that the EU flag does not hang on Czech government buildings. As was later pointed out by analysts and also Czech politicians, the EU flag only fails to hang at the President’s official residence, the Prague Castle – the Czech president has steadfastly refused to hang the flag there, arguing that the castle is a symbol of the Czech Republic and not Europe. France is the current EU president and will hand over the reigns to the Czech Republic on January 1st. It is widely assumed that many French diplomats including the French president have concerns about the direction of the impending EU presidency, particularly in light of the Czech president’s outwardly Eurosceptic stance.