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A museum in the Dutch town of Naarden, devoted to "the teacher of the nations", Czech humanist philosopher Johan Amos Comenius, may close due to a lack of finance. While the Czech government would like the museum to stay open, locals, who bear the main financial burden, need to economise. Finding a solution to the problem is complicated by ownership issues.

One of the most popular activities in the Czech Republic at this time of year is mushroom picking. Or at least it usually is - the long, dry summer this year has had left the ground very dry and mushrooms hard to find. It's got so bad that some Czech experts are even going abroad to find mushrooms. I discussed the situation with Miroslav Smotlacha, who is one of the leading members of the Czech Mycological Institute.

The authorities in Thailand announced recently that two Czech men serving long prison sentences for heroin smuggling will be allowed to return home, to serve their sentences in a Czech prison. The announcement came three months after the Czech Republic and Thailand signed an agreement allowing prisoner exchanges, the first step in what their relatives hope will lead to their eventual release. But how long the two will stay in prison once they return to this country is still unclear.

The German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer paid a brief to the Czech Republic on Tuesday, for talks dominated by European integration. In the morning Mr Fischer attended a gathering of Czech ambassadors at the Foreign Ministry, the first ever German Foreign Minister to attend such an event.

An unprecedented trial has just begun here in the Czech Republic, with the young editor of a far-left magazine in the dock. Having called for socialist revolution in the magazine Pochoden, or Torch, 24-year-old David Pecha stands accused of "spreading intolerance and hatred leading to the suppression of basic rights and freedoms". The trial has led to a debate on free speech, with some saying Mr Pecha's case should never have come to trial.

According to a law passed shortly after the fall of communism, all senior civil servants must undergo security screening to prove that they didn't collaborate with the former communist secret police. The plan which was to keep former agents out of the country's new democratic structures has shown itself to be far from foolproof however. Twelve years after its approval, the Czech Interior Ministry is plagued by unreliable screening certificates and admits that in a number of cases former communist agents may be operating in high posts.

Last week the Czech Republic's intelligence service BIS released a new report warning that the Russian mafia was still alive and well in the Czech Republic. According to the report illegal activities include everything from money laundering to human trafficking, to extortion to fraud. And, what's worse: gangs have become better organised and more inter-connected than in the past - making it increasingly difficult to crack down - and eventually root out - criminal activities at their source.

A nation-wide civil servants' strike - including tax-revenue officers and other state employees - especially teachers - has become an almost one-hundred percent certainty for September 1st. The reason for the strike: to send a message to the government, currently hammering out complex public finance reforms, that more money is needed for end-of-the-year bonuses for state employees. They expect an additional six billion crowns to somehow be found in an already tight state budget.

It's been a hot month of August in the Czech Republic's biggest national park in the Sumava Mountains - and that has little to do with the scorching heat of the summer. The park's management and environment activists are locked in a heated debate over the fate of some 1,000 trees that are infested with bark beetle

A military band played outside the Czech Radio building on Thursday morning, as politicians lined up to lay wreaths at the plaque to those who lost their lives defending the station in August 1968. It's thirty-five years to the day since the Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia, a day of reflection and remembrance for the Czech people. Czechoslovak Radio played a particularly important role in the hours that followed the invasion, as besieged reporters broadcast desperate appeals for help to the outside world.