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June 12, 1987: The President of the United States, Ronald Reagan, speaks in front of the Brandenburg Gate in West Berlin: "General-Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr Gorbachev, open this gate... Mr Gorbachev, tear down this wall!"

Two years ago, a brave young Czech couple, Michal Jon and Lucie Kovarikova, set off to conquer the world on their bicycles. First they headed north to Scandinavia. Then they crossed Russia, rode through Mongolia, China, South Korea and Japan and then took a flight to Australia. A year ago, Radio Prague spoke to them during their stopover in New Zealand. This time, Pavla Horakova caught up with Michal and Lucie in Los Angeles, California. She first asked Michal to recount the journey from Australia to California. California.

To the sound of local children playing traditional Czech folk music, a rather special exhibition of paintings was opened at the end of last week. Several hundred works by children from all over the world have gone on show in the unlikely setting of a small village in the countryside near Prague. But this village, Lidice, is different. Every year in June Lidice remembers one of the most horrific moments in the modern history of the Czech nation, when in 1942 - at the height of the German occupation - the Nazis wiped the village off the map. All

Since the Iron Curtain fell, Czech society has been increasingly exposed to the influence of other cultures. There are not only western tourists in Prague. Quite a few students and entrepreneurs, but also refugees, have come from Muslim countries, bringing elements of their culture and way of life with them. So what is the position of Muslims in the Czech Republic, and what attitudes and pre-conceptions do Czechs have about Islam? Martin Mikule has been finding out.

Three former students from the Faculty of Architecture at Brno's Technical University were ordered by a Moravian court on Thursday to apologise for libel against their former teacher some fourteen years ago, during the turbulent days of the Velvet Revolution. The student body leaders labelled communist party representative Jan Snasel an "arrogant demagogue" and an "opportunist".

One of the most tangible benefits of joining the European Union is that it is now much easier for Czechs to study abroad. This is a very attractive prospect not just for young Czechs - keen to gain qualifications, learn languages and see the world - but also for West European universities themselves. In the competitive environment of today's academic world universities are always on the look-out for good students. That was what brought a small team from the University of Salford in the north of England to Prague this week. They held a series of

For many years the Beatles have been hugely popular here in the Czech Republic, and this coming Sunday, Czechs fans are in for a rare treat, when Paul McCartney plays a concert in Prague, becoming the first of the Beatles to appear here. To find out what the concert will mean to Czechs, I spoke to politician, broadcaster and musician Michal Prokop, who himself started a rock band in the 1960s.

At the beginning of 2005 the Czech Army will become fully professional, welcome news for young Czech men, who will no longer have to do compulsory military service. The alternative to military duty - civic service - is also coming to an end. That will mean problems, however, for the organisations which have been relying on such cheap labour for years.

Many of our listeners will already be familiar with the Nuna 2 - the world's fastest solar-powered car. Last year it won the World Solar Challenge in Australia, clocking a record time of 140 kilometres per hour. Designed and built by a team of students from the Delft University of Technology in Holland, the Nuna is now on a special European tour, setting out from Greece in late May to make its way across the continent in the name of sustainable energy. On Wednesday the car and its team arrived in Prague.

Since the fall of communism, much has changed in attitudes to disabled people. Terms such as "easy access" or "wheelchair adapted" have gradually entered the everyday language; pavements, many buildings and buses have been adapted to enable people with impaired mobility to be less dependent on other people's assistance. But there are cases when simple ignorance causes severe difficulties to wheelchair users or the blind. This week a campaign is under way to make people more aware of what it is like to move around the city in a wheelchair or using