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At an emergency summit in Brussels on Thursday EU leaders suspended talks on visa-free travel with Russia and threatened far-reaching action should Moscow take further steps to destabilize Ukraine. The decision followed tough negotiations among member states, divided over how to react to the Russian aggression, and revealed the measure to which Europe’s hands are tied by its dependence on Russian crude oil and gas. Jakub Janda from the Prague-based European Values think tank says the decision was predictable since Europe itself would feel the backlash

The death has been announced of the man suspected of being behind one of the most perfidious plots hatched by Czechoslovakia’s Communist secret police, the StB. Shortly after the communist takeover of 1948, the StB created fake frontier posts in the west of the country, several kilometres short of the real border with Germany, in an elaborate operation that ensnared people trying to flee the Stalinist regime.

The Czech-produced Pirating Pirates, which premieres on Friday at Prague’s One World festival of human rights documentaries, looks at why some Somalis began raiding foreign vessels in the mid-1990s. But the film also has a fresh twist, as its makers find themselves struggling to establish the bona fides of locals claiming to be pirates and charging for interviews. I asked Pirating Pirates’ director David Čalek what had attracted him to the subject in the first place.

At first glance, the jibe of Napolean Bonaparte that the British were a nation of shopkeepers might seem to ring true. British based retailers Marks and Spencer, Tesco, and Debenhams are among some of the most visible exports to Czech cities. But the British are now seeking to significantly broaden their impact.

Web Junkies, currently screening at the One World festival of human rights documentaries in Prague, is a startling portrait of how China deals with teens hooked on online games. Indeed, it was the first country to classify internet addiction as a clinical disorder and has set up 400 treatment centres.

Widespread international condemnation of Russia’s intrusion into Ukraine has been replaced by controversy over how the democratic world should respond to the military occupation of Crimea. While the US is pushing for tough punitive measures against Moscow, EU foreign ministers are divided over the question of sanctions, and a similar dispute has now appeared in the Czech government.

The One World festival of human rights documentaries opened in Prague on Monday night with the world premiere of Miners Shot Down. A disturbing film, it maps a police massacre of striking workers at the Marikana mine in South Africa in 2012 that left 34 people dead.

The Czech government has voiced strong condemnation of Russia’s intrusion into Ukraine calling military action on the territory of a foreign state unsubstantiated and a breach of international law. Speaking after a meeting of the National Security Council on Sunday, Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka said Russia’s actions in Crimea were a violation of Ukraine’s sovereignty and the Czech Republic was ready to support a clear signal from the EU that this was unacceptable.

The tug-of-war continues over one of the most ambitious construction projects ever imagined, the building of a canal linking three of Europe’s mightiest rivers – the Elbe, the Oder and the Danube. It’s a pet project of President Miloš Zeman, who this week unveiled an exhibition devoted to it at the European Parliament in Strasbourg. However both the Czech Academy of Sciences and the Green Party have reasserted their opposition to the idea, saying it would have catastrophic consequences for the environment.

The long and bitter dispute between the Czech Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes and the European association of similar agencies came to a head on Wednesday when the Czechs announced they were leaving the Europe-wide network. Both sides quote several reasons behind the rift but ideological as well as personal animosities seem to be at the core of the squabble.