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The Czech Republic is mourning the loss of its three ice hockey stars in a plane crash that will be remembered as one of the worst sporting tragedies in history. Jan Marek, Karel Rachůnek and Josef Vašíček were among the 43 victims of Wednesday’s tragic plane crash in Russia which wiped out the entire Lokomotiv Yaroslavl hockey team.

The civilian intelligence agency, BIS, has issued a scathing report on malpractice and criminal activity within the Czech justice system. The agency’s annual report accuses judges and state prosecutors of a litany of shortcomings from sluggishness to connections to organised crime. On Thursday the Czech judges’ association went on the offence, comparing the allegations to a baseless tabloid report.

The lower house of parliament on Tuesday gave final approval to a bill which will provide local administrations with the means to fight air pollution more effectively. In the event of a smog alert mayors can order the biggest pollutants to scale down production, ban high-emissions cars from city centres and scrap toll on ring roads in order to reduce the amount of traffic. Town mayors and environment activists had long been pushing for the amendment and Radio Prague asked Vojtěch Kotecký from Friends of the Earth how effective he thinks it will

A new study has raised serious questions about diet and fitness in the Czech military after revealing that half of the army’s 22,000 soldiers are overweight. The alarming result means the military will introduce a low-fat diet, likely boost fitness testing and provide troops with fat-fighting pills. The last measure, though, has come under criticism – with many experts suggesting that medicine should only be used as a last resort.

Police have charged the woman assumed to be responsible for the most brutal child murder in modern Czech history. The 36-year-old is believed to have murdered all four of her children with a knife on Friday before making an unsuccessful attempt at suicide.

Construction workers in the Czech capital on Monday removed a final cubic metre of earth from the city’s Blanka tunnel – built to streamline traffic through busy parts of the city. The end of tunnelling means that traffic restrictions in several above ground areas will now be lifted. But work on the tunnel itself is far from finished.

The security situation in parts of North Bohemia, where tension between the Roma and non-Roma communities has been rising for weeks, failed to improve at the weekend – just the opposite. An illegal demonstration against the Roma community again tested police, who on Saturday blocked almost 1,000 participants from making their way to a local Roma settlement. Allegedly organised by a neo-Nazi group, the protest is seen as evidence that extremist groups are trying to exploit the deteriorating situation for their own ends.

The Czech Cultural Centre in London is gearing up for a big event this weekend – an exhibition of visual art by the Czech-born artist Kateřina Šedá called from Morning till Night. I asked the head of the centre, Ladislav Pflimpfl, who was on a brief visit to Prague this week, what it is all about and what else is in the pipeline for fans of Czech art this autumn.

A proposal to establish a state secretary for EU affairs, approved by the Czech cabinet on Wednesday, has divided the ruling coalition. While the proposal was pushed through by the Civic Democratic Party and Public Affairs the third party in government, TOP09, remains strongly opposed to the move which it claims to be in violation of the coalition agreement. The party, which holds the foreign ministry, fears the new post will detract from its powers and has demanded coalition talks on the issue. Petr Drulák, head of the Prague-based Institute of

Alois Nebel, the first Czech film that was produced with the rotoscoping technique – a process that renders images shot with actors in a unique black-and-white cartoon style – will be premiering at the prestigious International Film Festival in Venice this weekend. The movie, based on a cartoon novel by Jaroslav Rudiš that has garnered a cult following, is highly anticipated by Czech cinema lovers. Ahead of its premiere abroad, I caught up with Alois Nebel producer Pavel Strnad and asked him about the special technique it was made with, the film’s