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Next year, the Czech Army will see 1,500 members of the military, especially high-ranking officers, laid off, part of necessary changes in a period of strict austerity measures and budget cuts. As part of the plan, the army will close headquarters in both Olomouc and Stará Boleslav, following up on the layoffs of almost 3,000 military and civilian personnel three years ago.

The second round of Senate elections over the weekend dealt another blow to the centre-right coalition government. The left-wing parties boosted their dominant position in the upper chamber even gaining a constitutional majority which bodes ill for government reforms as the three ruling parties now struggle to maintain a razor-sharp majority in the lower house.

European leaders meeting in Brussels have agreed a timetable for the creation of a single banking supervisor for the eurozone. All 6,000 banks in the eurozone would be regulated by the European Central Bank; a mechanism that would essentially create a European banking union. But several countries are extremely sceptical, and they include the Czech Republic.

A man who lived for more than six months without a heart died at the weekend, ending a remarkable experiment in medicine that could pave the way for improving treatment of heart disease in the future. Jakub Halík, a 37-year-old former fireman, had been fitted with two artificial pumps after doctors treating an aggressive tumour had removed his heart altogether.

The European Union’s Court of Justice on Thursday banned Czech producers from using a name for a diary product that has been on the market for over thirty years. The court ruled that the popular butter spread or pomazánkové máslo may not have the word butter in its name, since its milk-fat content is lower than the 80% butter must have according to European law.

With talks underway on forming regional governments, the Social Democratic Party is still coming to terms with the fact that although it came first in last weekend’s regional elections it is the Communist Party which is regarded as the real winner. The Social Democrats failed to defend their 2008 victory in all 13 regions, coming first in 9, while the Communists won in two and came hard on their heels in most of the others, giving them the chance to drive a hard bargain in regional administration. Radio Prague spoke to Social Democrats deputy Jan

A court in Sheffield in the UK has heard the case of 19 people, including a group of Czech and Slovak women – who were part of a sham marriage ring. Between 2009 and 2011, the gang paid the sham brides to fly to Pakistan where fake marriages were arranged for them so that their husbands could apply for UK visas. The court has found guilty seven members of the gang; another 11 are awaiting the verdict while the two main organizers are on the run. RP discussed the case with UK-based Czech journalist Jan Jůn.

The ruling parties’ humiliating defeat in the weekend regional and first round of senate elections have clearly shaken the government’s resolve to effect painful reforms at any cost and left the prime minister fighting not just for the future of the centre-right government but his own place at the head of his party.

On Friday, Scottish composer Geraldine Mucha passed away in Prague, which has been her home for most of the past 70 years. Author of numerous musical works, large-scale orchestral pieces, variations on folk songs and chamber pieces, Geraldine came to post-war Czechoslovakia with her husband Jiří Mucha, the son of the famous artists Alphonse Mucha. For the past twenty years, she has been the keeper of her father-in-law’s legacy, but her life’s pursuit of music also helped pave the way for female composers of the younger generations.

The opposition Social Democrats and Communists dominated the regional elections and the first round of voting to a third of the Senate held in the Czech Republic at the weekend. The senior government parties suffered huge losses as voters manifested dissatisfaction with the government’s austerity measures and its inability to curb corruption. But even the Social Democrats did worse than four years ago while the Communist party emerged as the real winner of the vote.