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Around 100 people gathered on Thursday outside Indian embassies in the Czech Republic, Austria and Canada to protest the imprisonment of Emil Kučera, a Czech entomologist who was sentenced to three years in jail in the Indian state of West Bengal last week for illegally gathering rare insects.

It is a saga that has dragged on for almost two years - a pair of babies from Brno were accidentally exchanged at birth and given to the wrong parents. The mistake was discovered only a year later when the father of one of the children went for a paternity test, which revealed that neither the mother nor the father were the biological parents of their baby. Now the families are in court suing the hospital involved in the mix up, testifying for the first time this week. The families are each seeking 6 million crowns in compensation in what is proving

A two-day conference for Czech expatriates has just come to a close in Prague. The event attracted dozens of Czechs who left their homeland for a range of different reasons. Some were forced out by an unsympathetic regime, others sought better living conditions abroad, some fell in love. The meeting gave expatriates a chance to share their experiences, as well as defend their interests.

In a tent at the bottom of Wenceslas Square, a month-long project is has just got underway looking at the square both past and future. Prague’s main thoroughfare is set to be developed and changed in the coming years, with planners hoping to do away with the rather shabby image it has developed. The exhibition opened with a display of photographs by the renowned Czech photojournalist Vilém Kropp.

Since the beginning of the year the Czech capital and Central Bohemia have seen a marked increase in the incidence of Hepatitis A, a disease that can be caught off contaminated food or eating utensils or other objects. Almost 400 people, now including a number of school children, have come down with the disease since January – a jump of epidemic proportions from last year’s 128. Although hygiene centres, hospitals and schools have mobilised against the threat, things are still expected to get worse before the current epidemic is stifled.

Czech expatriates from as far afield as Australia and the United States have been meeting in Prague this week for a conference called ‘Czechs and Exile: 1948 and 1968’. Those present have been remembering the historic events that prompted them to leave the country, as well as comparing notes on Czech expatriate organizations in their different regions. Milan Kocourek is one of the people speaking at the conference. He has lived in Britain for the last 40 years, where he has worked for both the BBC and, today, Czech Radio. I met Mr Kocourek at the

The English language and international premiere of Václav Havel’s latest play Leaving takes place in London this Friday. It is part of a season focused on the former president’s work which is being organised in conjunction with London’s Czech Centre. I discussed the Havel season, and other highlights of this autumn’s programme, with the centre’s director, Ladislav Pflimpfl.

It might come as a surprise that there are any natural springs in Prague at all, but in fact there were over a hundred of them at last count. But those figures may soon be consigned to history as in Prague, as well as the rest of the country, these once important sources of drinking water disappear through neglect. The prospect depresses environmentalists, some of whom have set up a new internet project to save the springs. On a cold September morning, I visited one of Prague’s greenest outcrops to see some of the springs in danger and find out

Jíří Čunek, the country’s Deputy PM and Minister for Regional Development has been in trouble several times for his actions and statements regarding Czech Roma. This week, the Christian Democrat leader announced a plan to solve the so-called Roma problem within 10 years. The solution, to segregate Roma into various categories according to their willingness to be “civilized” has raised some eyebrows.

The global financial crisis, fuelled by the recent fall of Wall Street’s number four investment bank Lehman Brothers, has already hit markets in Central and Eastern Europe. Although no bankruptcies of mortgage providers on the national level are expected, the Czech economy will face a slow down as a result.