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Both houses of parliament met on Wednesday morning to elect a successor to President Vaclav Havel, who steps down in two and a half weeks time. While it was not at all certain who would win, one thing has been clear for some time - whoever succeeds Mr Havel will have a hard act to follow, particularly on the international stage.

This next item will be of special interest to listeners in North America who appreciate the performing arts: Sunday, January 19th, Czech Season in Canada, a year-long programme of theatre and dance events showcasing the talents of Czech performers, gets underway. Jan Velinger has this report.

There is little question now that the Czech Republic will try and assist the US if it comes to a ground war against Iraq. On Monday the Czech cabinet, joined by outgoing Czech President Vaclav Havel, met in a four hour session to decide it would try and meet a US request asking for the use of the Czech Republic's elite chemicals detection unit, as well the use of Czech airspace and territory, for the stationing of US troops - if it comes to war.

Though President Vaclav Havel co-operated with the Communists in the period just after the Velvet Revolution, for many years the former dissident and political prisoner has chosen to ignore the Communist Party, and has used the term democratic parties' to refer to all the parties in parliament, minus the Communists. Will Mr Havel's retirement offer the Communists - the third biggest party in the Chamber of Deputies, and the biggest in terms of membership - the chance to win wider acceptance on the political scene? I spoke to the party's deputy

A husband beat his wife severely and wrecked their apartment. He has been beating her for 6 years. She is desperate for help. This is just one of about 900 cases dealt with every year by the telephone helpline of the association ROSA, set up to assist victims of domestic violence. Now ROSA has brought out a book telling the stories of five Czech women who have survived hell. The question arises: is domestic violence being addressed properly in the Czech Republic? The following report was prepared by Katya Zapletnyuk.

One of the most controversial aspects of Vaclav Havel's presidency has been his use of the presidential power to pardon. Mr Havel has pardoned around 2,000 people, with some of those cases drawing a great deal of criticism. Now - as his term comes to an end - the president has been defending his actions. In an interview in the weekly newspaper Respekt published today, Mr Havel says that pardons are a question of personal conscience that essentially cannot be discussed. On the other hand, he believes that the power is a leftover from the days of

Around two dozen neo-Nazis abandoned a march through Prague's historic Jewish town on Saturday, following a last-minute ban issued by the local authorities. They had originally given permission for what organisers described as a "commemoration of the Holocaust." Only later did it emerge that the holocaust in question was actually "the holocaust against the Palestinian people committed by Israel" - and those attending the event would be neo-Nazi skinheads carrying flaming torches. Rob Cameron was there, and brings back this report.

Czech politics has in the last few days been consumed by the issue of whether the country should participate in a war against Iraq. The governing Social Democrats are split on the issue, as is part of the opposition.

Last month one of the Social Democrats' candidates for president, the popular Ombudsman Otakar Motejl, suffered a minor PR disaster when a newspaper revealed he had accidentally killed a pedestrian in a road accident in the late 1970s. Mr Motejl was convicted of causing death by dangerous driving, although he never served a prison sentence and was later pardoned. One of the many people who said Mr Motejl should have told the public about the accident was rival Social Democrat candidate Jaroslav Bures, the man later chosen by his party as their

The Czech government announced on Wednesday evening that Washington had formally asked for support in any military action against Iraq. Following a three-hour meeting of the National Security Council, Prime Minister Vladimir Spidla said the cabinet would discuss the request in detail next week before presenting it to parliament for approval.