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Havel-Klaus Showdown
Two rivals meet at long last. This is what most of us here must have thought when hearing that Czech President Václav Havel has accepted an invitation from his anathema, former premier and now the Lower House Speaker Václav Klaus to meet and try to change the seedy atmosphere that has been reigning supreme in this country for many months now. The meeting, scheduled for Monday, is significant also because there have been indications that Klaus could succeed Havel as president. Libor Kubik reports.
In his televised New Year address to the nation, President Havel spoke of walls and barriers separating various strata of the Czech population more than nine years of the collapse of the Berlin Wall and the demise of Communism in Europe. He specifically criticised the cynical approach of the Czech right-as personified by Mr Klaus-to such lofty values as freedom and democracy.
On Monday, Havel accepted an invitation by Klaus to meet and talk things over. Where Havel sees walls and barriers, Klaus warns of a blind alley of self-destruction into which Czech politics and society have been driven by their own doing.
I don't think we can afford to go on destroying ourselves like that. What with all this flagellation-and here Klaus referred to news about a slumping economy and rising crime-we just cannot carry on. Let's try and change that, he said, adding that he cannot agree with the conventional wisdom that Havel and Klaus don't meet and talk. Any opinion swap through the media is absurd, Klaus said in an apparent reference to author Havel's favourite literary genre-the absurd drama.
On Monday, then, the two enlightened rivals will meet and talk over lunch in the Golden Room of the Prague Castle-the ceremonial seat of the heads of the Czech state.
The announcement, made by the Presidential Office on Monday, seems to have solved a problem that has preoccupied Havel watchers for the past few weeks. Namely, when will the First Couple finally return from their holiday on Lanzarote Island in the Canaries, at the invitation of Spanish King Juan Carlos. Until Monday, the President's office had been unable to tell when the head of state will return to Prague. Many foreign observers in Prague had considered the Castle's behaviour inappropriate, and its lack of information about the plans of the Czech head of state scandalous.
Unemployment Increases
The unemployment rate in the Czech Republic reached an
unprecedented 7.5 percent. Olga Szantova looks at the reasons and
the implications of this situation.
Only the oldest inhabitants of this country, those who lived
through the recession in the 1930s remember unemployment as high
as the contemporary rate. Then, during the war, and during the
years of so called Communist planned economy, unemployment was
virtually unknown. Economists and politicians did warn that the
free market economy would bring unemployment, but for some time it
kept at a steady three, or slightly over three percent. And then
it started growing until, at the end of 1998, it reached 7.5
percent, which experts say, still isn't the final figure.
Many job
opportunities were closed down with the end of the year, so
January will, in all probability, bring the unemployment rate up
to 8 percent. That of course, is the average throughout the whole
country. In some areas the situation is much worse, especially in
the Northern part of the country, around 15.5 percent in Most and
Louny, for example, nearly 15 percent in Chomutov.
While it is
much lower in other areas, especially in central Bohemia, just
over 1.5 percent East of Prague, under 2.5 percent in Prague
itself, there is no way people can move following job
opportunities. Housing is one of the major problems. There just
aren't any vacancies. Unless one has enough money to pay black
market rent rates, which are exorbitant, especially in Prague,
practically the only way one can move is to exchange one's
apartment with somebody else, obviously not a feasible option when
trying to move away from a region with excessive unemployment.
Helping the regions most affected is one of the government's main
priorities in solving the problem and is a part of the strategy
announced by the cabinet. It includes incentives for founding new
job opportunities, re-qualification of the unemployed, etc. But
none of these are fast working solutions. Meanwhile one of the
most important problems, with the greatest long term implications,
is the unemployment of young people, fresh graduates.
At this
point, half a year after finishing school, 68 000 young people are
jobless, and in December there were only 6 thousand job
opportunities for them, that's nearly 11 young applicants for
every job opportunity. But, again, that's just the average, in the
district of Trebic, for example, the 800 last year graduates
weren't offered a single job.
As I've said, the situation will
obviously get worse, before it has a chance to improve. Industry
has to be reorganised, modernised and that, of course, in the
first stage, means fewer jobs. Big companies, like SPT Telecom,
the Skoda car producers and others have already announced hundreds
of redundancies in the near future.
Czech visa policy
The Czech cabinet has again postponed its discussion on the Czech
Republic's visa policy and it has not yet been decided when the matter
will be back on the negotiating table. Alena Skodova reports.
Foreign Minister Jan Kavan has announced that after Monday's debate he
withdrew a proposal for the abolishion of visa-free travel for Moldova.
The discussion on the re-imposition of visa requirement for Belarus
citizens has been postponed, too. Kavan told journalists that this was
mainly due to the fact that the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs
hadn't had a chance to voice its opinion. He added, though, that the re-
imposition of visas for those countries whose citizens must apply for
visas when travelling to the EU states, is viewed differently by
individual cabinet members.
Kavan himself is against making rash
decisions, citing possible worsening of trade relations as the main
reason. The Foreign Minister doesn't think, though, that the visa
requirement would have a substantially negative impact on Czech
relations with the countries in question. In connection with this, Kavan
mentioned Romania, Bulgaria and Slovakia as those countries for which -
in his view - it would not be necessary to re-impose visas. According to
him, there's no hurry as the Czech Republic will have to subordinate to
the Schengen agreement, which protects the outer borders of the EU, only
after the country enters the Union. Romania and Bulgaria are among the
contenders for future EU membership - and therefore it's not certain if
it will be necessary to implement a visa-requirement policy against
these two countries, Kavan noted.
As far as Belarus is concerned, the
country's consul in the Czech Republic, Vladzimir Kurankou said that
Belarus might re-impose visa-requirement for Czech citizens as a
retaliatory measure.
Korda says face fellow players
Czech tennis star Petr Korda, who has tested positive for
steroid use, on Tuesday vowed to defend his title and his
sporting honour at the Australian Open, which starts on
Monday. Libor Kubik reports.
"I have never knowingly taken or been treated with a prohibitive
substance," 31-year-old Australian Open champion said a day before
the start of the Colonial Classic tune-up event at Kooyong, where
he is among eight big names taking part.
"I would never try to gain an unfair advantage over my fellow
players," he declared. In recent weeks, Korda has been embroiled
in a drugs storm after it was revealed that he tested positive for
the steroid Nandrolone last summer at Wimbledon.
He insists he has no idea how the drug got into his body. An
appeals panel appointed by the International Tennis Federation
agreed with his argument of innocence in the affair and did not
hand down a one-year ban as prescribed under the rules.
The Czech did lose 199 ranking points and almost 95,000 dollars
prize money he earned at Wimbledon. The ITF is now taking its
appeal to world sport's highest review panel, the CAS, in
Switzerland, a process which could take up to three months.
Korda has been practising in Melbourne this week on the Rebound
Ace. While some players including former Wimbledon winner Richard
Krajicek and Jonas Bjorkman have said he should be banned, Korda
received a significant gesture of friendship on Monday.
In front of banks of television cameras, former world number one
Andre Agassi made a point of hitting with Korda on the Centre Court
of Melbourne Park, the site of the first Grand Slam of the season
which starts on Monday.
Korda said no player has told him to his face that he should miss
the Australian event, his only career Grand Slam title, won last
February over Chile's Marcelo Rios.
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