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At 67 Karel Gott remains the country's biggest pop star. In a long and very successful career he has sold tens of millions of albums in the Czech Republic, Germany and elsewhere. Now, however, the singer has entered a whole new field - endorsing supermarket products.

Great Britain recently made the headlines when it announced that it will not extend its open door policy to workers from Romania and Bulgaria, when the two countries join the European Union in slightly under two months' time. Other states, such as Poland and Finland, will open their labour markets. Now the latter camp has been joined by the Czech Republic. But the labour minister says restrictions could be introduced later, if need be.

The Mexican holiday Day of the Dead brings together the world of spirits and the world of the living. Celebrants spend the days from October 31 to November 2 remembering their deceased ancestors and preparing offerings to present at cemeteries and shrines. The lives of the dead are celebrated with a big feast that includes traditional foods like sweet bread and candy skulls. For the second year in a row, this tradition has been celebrated here in Prague.

All Souls Day - the day of remembrance for friends and loved ones who have passed away - has great significance in the Czech Republic. For the past few days Czechs have been visiting cemeteries across the country - often traveling hundreds of kilometers - to lay flowers and light candles at the graves of their relatives and loved ones. Dusicky - or "Souls" - as it is called in Czech is an annual pilgrimage that has taken place since pagan times.

The Czech Republic has around 30,000 registered bone marrow donors. But almost none of them can help a patient who has antigens, substances stimulating immune responses, which are uncommon in this part of the world. A new project launched by the Czech Bone Marrow Transplant Foundation now hopes to find donors among the country's Arab and Kurdish communities. At special gatherings, they are informed about bone marrow transplants and can register with an application form in Arabic.

It has been 150 days since general elections in June produced an inconclusive result and the country has been without a stable government ever since. For the first time since last weekend's Senate elections, President Vaclav Klaus has commented on the situation; he said it is no longer possible to prolong a state when the country is governed by a cabinet which does not have the backing of the lower house.

In the first 20 years of Czechoslovakia's existence, the new nation's most important neighbor was the huge country lying directly to the North and West, Germany. A fascinating account of political and cultural relations between the two nations during that period has just been published - the diaries of the Czech diplomat Camill Hoffmann.

The leader of the Social Democrats, Jiri Paroubek, has come under fire from within his own party, after an unimpressive showing in the Senate and local elections. There were also rumblings of disapproval from the Social Democrats' influential former chairman Milos Zeman, which in the past has signalled the writing on the wall for previous Social Democrat leaders.

The National Memorial on Vitkov Hill in Prague is a structure hard to miss. It is a severe rectangular building with no windows, accompanied by a large statue of 15th-century Czech military commander Jan Zizka, astride his horse, as if keeping guard over the city. Built in the 1930s, the memorial was meant to house the remains of Czech soldiers who fought in foreign legions on the battlefields of the First World War. A recent commercial event in the - now scarcely used - building has prompted Czech war veteran associations to raise their voices

Haruki Murakami—perhaps the greatest living Japanese author—is currently here in the Czech capital. The main purpose of his visit is to collect the annual Franz Kafka award - which is perhaps appropriate, given that Murakami's own work bears the influence of Kafka, one of the greatest Prague-born writers of all time. Emily Udell reports.