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Leaders of the 25 current and future members of the European Union met in Rome in weekend for the formal start of the so-called inter-governmental conference, or IGC. Over the following weeks and months, the IGC will discuss the controversial blueprint for the future of Europe - the draft EU constitution. The document was painstakingly put together by the Convention on the Future of Europe, a body made up of around 100 national representatives. But do they themselves believe the fruit of their labours will survive the rigours of the IGC? One of

The average wage in the Czech Republic has been growing steadily over the past years, sometimes even faster than labour productivity. Yet two thirds of Czech workers earn less than the national average and the gap between the best paid and least paid employees continues to widen.

The sounds of a nightingale, a reed warbler and a toad. Nothing special in the Czech countryside. But it is rather unusual to hear all of them at once in one location in a city. Yet there is such a site in Prague, where you can find forty species of birds and a large number of amphibians, many of them protected. It is a small swamp squeezed in between three railway lines on the outskirts of Prague, facing the danger of succumbing to the pressure of the sprawling city.

About eighteen percent of women and six percent of men are affected by migraine - that statistic is valid worldwide. In this country, between 300,000 and 400,000 people are affected by that severe and usually form of headache, frequently associated with nausea and vomiting. Although this chronic and recurring disease makes people's life extremely miserable, as much as 50 percent of migraine sufferers never consult a doctor. Dr Tomas Melichar is behind a new project that tries to make access to treatment easier for migraine patients in the Czech

This past Saturday saw the opening of an all important inter-governmental conference in Rome, bringing together leaders from all fifteen current EU countries and ten countries and slated to join in May next year. On the table: a final phase of negotiations aimed at streamlining the EU's draft constitution, a two-hundred plus page document that will outline, once and for all, a new legal and moral framework for the European Union. Already there have been indications this will not be an easy task. Jan Velinger was in Rome at the weekend and he joins

With the Czech Republic expecting to become a fully-fledged member of the European Union next May, one of the main topics of discussion among the country's academics has been the fear of a loss of Czech identity. Prague's Academia bookstore has just hosted a discussion forum at which respected historians and social scientists debated the importance and popularity of Czech national symbols today. One of the main speakers was historian and current deputy-prime minister Petr Mares:

Tension has mounted around the Czech military field hospital stationed in Iraqi town of Basra over the past few days. The Czech contingent have been accused by an Iraqi religious leader of defaming the Koran, and Wednesday saw a demonstration of more than a thousand people outside the field hospital demanding that the Czechs apologise.

The Beatles have been hugely popular in this country since the 1960s, even though in those days their records were not so easy to find. To honour the group, the Czech Beatles fanclub on Friday unveiled an unusual tribute - four oak trees bearing their names in the beautiful Pruhonice park near Prague. The chairman of the Beatles fanclub, Jiri Svatek, visited Radio Prague on Thursday; before he told us about the new tribute, Mr Svatek explained why the Fab Four were so popular in 60s Czechoslovakia.

At a recent presentation of his new book in Prague, the "world's most famous hacker" Kevin Mitnick admitted that he did not know any Czech hackers. Obviously, that does not mean that there aren't any: Web Pirates, Lenin Alive, ExE, binary division, to name just a few.

Anyone with more than a passing interest in computers may at one time or another have heard of Kevin Mitnick - by all standards one of the most famous computer hackers in the world. After being hunted down by the F.B.I. he sent to several years in prison for computer fraud. The court that sentenced him ruled he was "dangerous when armed with a keyboard". A slogan he successfully markets today, even though he has reformed his ways.