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The Czech coalition government has moved to tighten the rules for the financing of political parties. The proposed measures include a 3 million crown ceiling on donations from individual sponsors and a cap on the amount of money that parties can spend on election campaigns. The draft bill also envisages the setting up of an independent body which would supervise the financing of political parties. I asked political commentator Jiří Pehe how he views the proposed measures.

The head of the Czech Roman Catholic church has criticised plans to host events in August’s Prague Pride LGBT festival at the city’s parish of St. Salvatore, headed by priest and professor Tomáš Halík. In a statement, Cardinal Dominik Duka said it was inappropriate for the church to be involved with events advocating for interests sharply at odds with its own.

Thirty-two-year-old Nabire, one of the last Northern white rhinos on Earth, died at Dvůr Králové Zoo in the Czech Republic on Monday night from complications from a ruptured cyst. Her death brings the number of surviving Northern white rhinos to just four: three live on the Ol Pejeta Reserve in Kenya and one at the San Diego Zoo in the US. Jan Velinger has the details.

Once a fairly rare species in towns and cities, cyclists are increasingly common in the Czech Republic even in cities and hilly areas where the habitat is not so welcoming. Proposed changes in the law from the Ministry of Transport are now looking to give them higher priority with their own cycle roads in some city centres and help fill in the gaps between existing cycle routes.

The Czech Republic is calling for closer regional cooperation in dealing with the ongoing migrant crisis in Europe. At a meeting in the south Moravian border town of Mikulov, Czech Interior Minister Milan Chovanec and Austrian Interior Minister Johanna Leitner discussed measures that would help stem the flow of illegal migrants from the south-east.

A proposed amendment on the holding of firearms in the Czech Republic will not require consumers to register airsoft pistols or rifles in the near future. Some had hoped the sale of airsoft guns – which are often almost perfect replicas of existing weapons – should also be regulated, not least given how often they are used in armed robberies.

The Czech Republic is experiencing its worst drought in the last 12 years with some parts of the country having hardly seen any major rainfall for a month. Ministries are now looking at ways of dealing with a situation that threatens to become a more regular feature in the future.

Three people died and others were left fighting for their lives after a train travelling at over 150 kilometres an hour crashed into a lorry at a level crossing in North Moravia on Wednesday. The truck had evidently entered the level crossing despite warning signals and its Polish driver has now been charged with reckless endangerment.

The regional court in Prague on Thursday passed a verdict in one of the most closely watched court cases in the country’s modern history. David Rath, a former high ranking member of the Social Democratic Party and governor of Central Bohemia, was found guilty of corruption and manipulating public tenders.

TOP 09 chairman Karel Schwarzenberg has somewhat disappeared from public view in recent times. Despite this, and the fact he is now 77, he says he still wants to lead the right-wing party into the next general elections, scheduled for 2017. But what is behind Mr. Schwarzenberg’s desire to carry on?