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In just a few days parliament is due to appoint a new Council for TV and Radio Broadcasting, to replace the previous Council which was sacked over the TV Nova arbitration affair. But the government appears to be putting pressure on the new body even before it's come into existence: Culture Minister Pavel Dostal was quoted as saying on Monday there were clear grounds for the Council to revoke TV Nova's licence - something the previous Council stubbornly refused to do. With such a politically sensitive appointment just days away Mr Dostal's comments

The Czech Republic has joined five other nations at a meeting of Iraqi representatives in Baghdad on Monday to discuss the establishment of a new interim government. The meeting comes on the eve of discussions within the Czech government on the possibilities of delivering humanitarian aid to Iraq.

An opinion survey commissioned by the World Wildlife Fund shows that Czechs are deeply aware of the need to protect the country's environment. A full eighty percent of Czechs want more of the country's as yet unpolluted regions to be turned into protected national parks and reservations, sixty percent of the population would ban any lumbering activities in such areas as well as the construction of new roads or ski-lifts. "The figures are higher than expected, higher than those of many EU states, and we hope that this will be a message to Czech

Music lovers in Prague will be sad to hear the news that the annual Respect ethnic world music festival will not be held at Prague Castle. President Vaclav Klaus announced this week that he no longer wanted to support the music festival. But, the festival will still go ahead this year, Prague City Hall has come to the rescue.

No matter how many centuries we have been living in a civilised society, psychologists say that deep inside we are still hunters and gatherers. And some remain that in the literal sense. In fact, the Czech Republic has a whole army of hunters - around 140,000 and almost one hundred thousand of them are registered with the Czech Hunters' Union - an organisation which celebrates its 80th birthday this week.

Prime Minister Vladimir Spidla has fought plenty of battles to preserve his party's unity in recent months. Now he can breathe a sigh of relief. The former industry and trade minister Jiri Rusnok, whom he clearly considered the biggest trouble maker within the Social Democratic Party has vacated his parliament post - and the political arena.

The initial period which followed the end of communism and the transformation of the Czech economy were marred by a number of questionable business activities. Asset stripping, or tunnelling as it is reffered to in the Czech Republic, and curious bankruptcies were not uncommon occurrences. Ask anyone who knows anything about this in the Czech Republic and one name will come up - Viktor Kozeny.

Preventive measures have been in place for weeks on flights to Prague's Ruzyne airport, to help guard against the spread of the deadly SARS virus. Around seventeen patients in the Czech Republic have been in hospital under surveillance, but no cases have been confirmed so far. Nevertheless, experts say, it is only a matter of time before the first incidence of the virus appears even here. Jan Velinger reports.

Justice Minister Pavel Rychetsky has announced a planned amendment to the penal code which would entail harsher punishment for capital offences. Serious crimes such as terrorism, hostage-taking, murder, torture, rape and child abuse -for which there is now a maximum 15 year sentence -should, according to minister Rychetsky - be punishable by up to 25 years in prison. The proposal has been well received both by the public and the Union of Czech Judges. Judge Jan Vyklicky explains why change is necessary:

Thursday marks International Day Against Animal Experiments, a day when animal rights activists around the world demonstrate against the use of laboratory animals in science and for the testing of cosmetics and other products. The Czechs may be a nation of animal lovers, but animal rights is not very high on the agenda - this is after all a country where vegetarianism is rare and where women wear fur coats in the winter with impunity. Jan Lorenc is from the Czech animal rights organisation Freedom for Animals, earlier we asked him what his organisation