Current Affairs | All stories

Switch on your TV here in the Czech Republic and you’ll see numerous familiar shows – Dr House, Bones, Downton Abbey – but they’re invariably dubbed into Czech; rarely are they shown in the original with subtitles. A group of secondary school students wants to change that, and have launched a new campaign to petition public and private broadcasters to stop dubbing their output.

President Miloš Zeman says the European Union will put pressure on Canada to lift visas for Czech citizens, reintroduced in 2009 following a rise in the number of Roma people seeking asylum. Mr Zeman made the comments in a speech to members of the Czech Republic’s permanent representation to the European Union, after meeting European Commission President José Manuel Barroso.

Czech members of the European Parliament have a below par performance overall, according to a new study released on Thursday by the Prague-based think-tank European Values. On average, Czech MEPs seem to attend fewer meetings and participate less actively than their colleagues.

Tuesday was the cut-off line for registering in October’s general elections. Twenty-four parties and groupings have applied for registration, 17 of them fielding candidates in all 14 regions. Apart from the established parties voters will be able to choose from a vast number of small parties and groupings, who are hoping to ride on the wave of public discontent.

Viktoria Plzeň welcomed a star-studded Manchester City team on Tuesday for their first group game in this season’s Champions League. But while a spirited performance saw the West Bohemian club keep City at bay for the first half, the gulf in class told in the second and the visitors ultimately ran out comfortable 3:0 winners.

The Forum 2000 conference concludes in Prague on Tuesday evening. Over the past three days, over 140 distinguished speakers from around world discussed a wide range of issues related to the event’s central theme this year: societies in transition. The closing panel featured the Dalai Lama and focused on, among other subjects, the experience of former Soviet bloc countries and the legacy of the late Václav Havel.

Hundreds of angry miners took to the streets of Ostrava on Tuesday to protest against planned wage cuts and growing job insecurity in the region. After a year of negotiations employers and trade union representatives are nowhere near reaching a deal on the 2014 to 2018 collective agreement, and there is a growing fear of layoffs in a region that already has over 100,000 unemployed.

The 17th Forum 2000 conference is underway in Prague, bringing together over a hundred intellectuals, former and current politicians and other distinguished figures from around the world. This year’s Forum is focused on two subjects: the legacy of its founder, the late Václav Havel, and how countries can make the transition to democracy. Among the speakers are the Tibetan leader Dalai Lama, the Chinese human rights activist Chen Guangcheng, and Burma’s opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

Campaigning in October’s general elections got off the ground this week with a number of new and established parties presenting their election programmes. In addition to the usual election rivalry between established parties and promises of change from newcomers, an unexpected player has entered the fray: President Milos Zeman is campaigning hard for his own party, regardless of criticism from all sides. I spoke to political analyst Jiří Pehe about the character of this election campaign and the president’s role in it.

When Miloš Zeman was chosen as the Czech Republic’s first directly elected president earlier this year, much of the credit for his victory went to Miroslav Šlouf, his long-time, somewhat shadowy ‘adviser’ who masterminded his successful election campaign. So many are still struggling to comprehend the bizarre series of events of the past 24 hours. First it was announced he’d been nominated to lead Mr Zeman’s Citizens’ Rights Party (SPOZ) in Prague in next month’s elections; within hours it was announced he would not be standing. So what’s going