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Theatres and other state-subsidised arts institutions were celebrating victory over Prague’s City Council this week after councillors scrapped a controversial new system of awarding subsidies. The system – under which Prague’s theatres were subsidised according to the number of tickets sold – sparked a wave of protest by arts organisations and even led to angry artists disrupting a meeting of the city council.

Just a week ago the Czech ice hockey player Jiří Hudler celebrated the greatest success of his career, when his club the Detroit Red Wings won the NHL’s Stanley Cup. Hudler, who is 24, is now looking forward to showing the coveted trophy to fans in his home town of Olomouc during the summer. Soon after he arrived at Prague Airport on Wednesday morning, I spoke to the young star about his Stanley Cup success, and the retirement (announced on Monday) of team-mate Dominik Hašek.

The rape and murder of 9-year-old Jakub Šimánek from Havlíčkův Brod has shocked the nation, leading to questions why more wasn’t done to keep track of the suspect - a repeat sex offender from neighbouring Slovakia. The Slovak national spent years in detention and upon release was ordered to undergo outpatient treatment. The fact that he didn’t should have set the alarm bells ringing.

A series of 4km fun run events will be held in cities and towns across the Czech Republic this year, in order to raise money and awareness for cancer research in the country. The format of the events will be similar to that of a successful scheme in the UK which has been running since 1994. And, like the UK events, the Czech version will be sponsored and organised with the help of supermarket giant Tesco. I went along to the inaugural press conference to find out more.

Dominik Hašek - goaltender for the Detroit Red Wings and one of the best goalies in the history of the NHL – announced on Monday he was retiring from hockey. Although it is not the first time Hašek has announced giving up the game, at 43 this is likely to be his last. Over 16 years Hašek won the Stanley Cup twice as well as gathered countless personal awards including the NHL’s Hart Trophy for most valuable player in the playoffs (twice) and the Vezina for best goalie during the regular season (six times). He also led the Czech Republic to Olympic

At the end of April, activists from the Greenpeace environmental group set up a camp on a patch of land in the Brdy military to protest against the US radar facility to be built there and refused to leave the site in spite of repeated warnings by the military police. After waiting for more than six weeks for hunger and thirst to drive them away the police finally took action on Monday and evicted the campaigners by force. Ruth Fraňková spoke to Jiří Tutter, the head of the Czech branch of Greenpeace, and started by asking him to outline the reason

The heat is on Prime Minister Mirek Topolánek’s centre right government. Half-way though implementing its programme of fiscal reforms it is racked by internal conflict, under fire from the opposition and growing pressure from trade unions. There are now serious doubts as to whether it can meet its set goals.

The European Commission’s Prague office hosted a conference on Friday on Slovenia’s experience in adopting the single European currency and how the Czech Republic could learn from it. Unlike Slovenia, which joined the eurozone in 2007, or Slovakia, which will join in 2009, the Czech Republic has no fixed target date for euro adoption and it will be many years before the euro arrives. So what can the Czechs learn from Ljubljana?

The centre-right government has been hit by the most serious crisis in its existence, with Prime Minister Mirek Topolánek admitting the possibility of a minority government. There is now infighting within each of the three coalition parties – the Civic Democrats, the Christian Democrats and the Greens – with a number of MPs opposing various issues on the cabinet’s agenda. One of the outspoken rebels is Civic Democrat deputy Vlastimil Tlustý, who earlier this month torpedoed the government’s plan for the restitution of church property. Radio Prague

We're now just a day away from the start of the Euro 2008 Football Championships in Austria and Switzerland. The Czech team will of course be there, and is in fact playing in the tournament's opening fixture on Saturday evening. I went and found out how Prague is gearing up to mark the events and found out what expectations people in the city have of their national side.