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Transport and services union leader Jaromír Dušek has evoked outrage on the Czech political scene by launching a vicious and homophobic attack on the management of Czech Railways. In an interview for Saturday’s Lidové Noviny, Mr. Dušek said Czech Railways was run by a clique of incompetent gays who had links to homosexuals in the cabinet and the Office of the Government. The controversial trade union leader has now been barred from speaking for the umbrella trade unions organization and is likely to face charges of slander.

The fates of Czech soldiers who died abroad during the first and second world wars are being mapped in a newly created War Graves Record. The internet-based project documents more than 1,800 war graves around the world where Czech soldiers are buried, along with information about how and when they died.

While all eyes were on the awarding of the Oscars in Los Angeles on Sunday, the main event in cinema in the Czech Republic came a day earlier with the awarding of the Czech Lions. This year ten Czech films competed in 13 categories. The film Protektor by director Marek Najbrt dominated, winning six awards on the night, including Best Picture.

TOP 09 leader Karel Schwarzenberg and his team have just launched an unusual campaign aimed at getting young Czechs to vote. It revolves around the charismatic politician himself: voters can connect with him via online chats and even win the chance to spend an evening at the pub with Mr. Schwarzenberg. But what role does the leader’s popularity play in the overall success of this new party?

Monday is International Women’s Day, and in 2010 that means one hundred years since the holiday was introduced. The idea to highlight the struggle for women’s rights around the world picked up a different tone in communist countries like Czechoslovakia though, and was largely discarded after 1989. Now some NGOs in the Czech Republic want to use the 100th anniversary to reawaken the spirit of activism that Women’s Day originally stood for.

NATO’s Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen is in the Czech Republic for a two-day visit, primarily to drum up support for a heightened Czech military presence in Afghanistan. On Friday, Mr Rasmuseen met with the Czech Prime Minister Jan Fischer, whose government has already approved an increase of Czech troops in the war-ridden country. But the decision has yet to be sanctioned by the Czech Parliament, and NATO’s Secretary General is later scheduled to meet with party leaders to try to win their support for the plan.

Ornithologists in the Beskydy mountains in the far east of the country are celebrating the possible return of the golden eagle after an absence of more than 100 years. A project to reintroduce young eagles to the area appears to have borne fruit – two of the birds have formed a pair, and have now started building a nest.

This Sunday, March 7, marks the 160th anniversary of the birth of one of the absolute giants of Czech history, Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk. The founder of Czechoslovakia and the state’s first president was born in Hodonín, and the south Moravian town is currently gearing up to celebrate the anniversary. To find out exactly how Hodonín will be honouring Masaryk on Sunday, I spoke to town hall spokesperson Petra Kotásková.

Japanese promoters have expressed interest in bringing to Japan one of the most grandiose pieces in the history of Czech art, Alphonse Mucha’s Slav Epic. They are even offering to finance the restoration of the monumental, which consists of 20 huge canvasses. But both the city of Prague, which owns the work, and Mucha’s grandson are hesitant to let it travel so far.

Prague is one of a few sites in Europe that has been chosen as an access point for Hollywood director Steven Spielberg’s collection of Holocaust recollections. The link with the Spielberg-financed Shoah Foundation has already created strong interest locally after only a few weeks.