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The national intelligence agency, BIS, says that efforts to curb right-wing extremism in the Czech Republic have borne fruit. The agency’s quarterly report on extremism, released this week, shows that the domestic neo-fascist movement is in disarray thanks to several years of heavy crackdowns by the police and the state. Christian Falvey has this report.

The Czech government wants to implement a radical change of direction in the management of the Šumava National Park in southern Bohemia. On Monday, the director of the country’s largest nature reserve, František Krejčí, stepped down – as he put it – in order to facilitate negotiations between the authorities and the local communities on the planned changes. But Czech environmentalists are concerned the director’s resignation will open the way for firms who want to increase logging in the park.

Not a tragedy - at least not yet - is how the country’s Education Minister Josef Dobeš is rating the results of a recent school-leaving exam in a trial run. Those were announced earlier this week showing that almost a third of students had flunked, receiving fails in subjects like English, German and Math.

The Czech health sector is facing serious problems. Around a quarter of hospital doctors have given warning that they will leave to work abroad unless there are given significant wage increases. The Health Ministry says it cannot meet their demands. The crisis from this standoff is looming in the New Year, the deadline given by doctors. But many of them already appear to be preparing to leave.

The 2010 World Expo in Shanghai closed its doors on Sunday, having attracted more than 70 million visitors from the world over. The success of the Czech pavilion surpassed expectations, it had more than 8 million visitors and won several awards. Radio Prague called the pavilion’s chief press officer Jiří F. Potužník in Shanghai to ask how happy the Czech representation was with the outcome:

Thursday marked the 92nd anniversary of the founding of Czechoslovakia, and as always on that day a group of outstanding figures received the country’s highest honours. This year, President Václav Klaus bestowed medals upon 22 men and women, among them heroes of the Second World War and accomplished individuals from the worlds of science, sports and culture.

EU leaders have agreed at a summit in Brussels on limited changes to the Lisbon Treaty aimed at protecting the bloc’s economy. The Czech prime minister, Petr Nečas, is cool on the idea of amending the document, saying it would be better to find a simpler way of creating a new crisis management system. Mr Nečas has also criticised a proposed increase in the EU’s 2011 budget, saying in a time of austerity the Union too should keep spending down.

This weekend the small but increasingly popular Kocour brewery, based in Varnsdorf, north Bohemia, will be hosting the first ever Ale festivale – a festival highlighting local and foreign specialty beers. Kocour (which means tomcat in English) itself produces 10 different styles based on differences in ingredients, production and history and want to let the average consumer know there’s more to beer than just their usual brand.

The Region of South Moravia is notably rich in archaeological sites, having been home to Celtic, Germanic and other tribes before the coming of the Slavs. One of the places that has been yielding more information about those peoples is the area around Pasohlávky, on the Dyje River. Archaeologists have spent years there studying the remains of a military camp built by Roman invaders in what was then the domain of the Germanic Marcomanni. This week, the scientific team working at the site announced the discovery of a wealth of objects that cast more

The first Cuban political prisoner granted political asylum in the Czech Republic has arrived with his family and relatives in his host country. The dissident, who spent six out of seven years in prison in solitary confinement hit out at the regime in his homeland and thanked the Czech Republic for its solidarity.