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Semyon Bychkov has just been appointed as successor to the late Jiří Bělohlávek as principal conductor of the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra.

Wages and jobs have been pushed as one of the main themes of Czech parliamentary elections. And a proposal from the finance ministry to open the door to around 200,000 foreign workers has sparked fresh clashes over the subject.

An exhibition mapping the history of six panelak housing estates in Prague got underway on Thursday at the city’s Dejvice district. It is the last in a series of fourteen exhibitions dedicated to the communist-era prefabricated apartment blocks around the Czech Republic, prepared by the Museum of Creative Arts.

This year’s Signal festival of light has just got underway in Prague. Check out this video of some of the best installations and shows from what organisers say is the country’s best-attended arts event. And if you can make it along yourself, the fifth edition of Signal concludes on Sunday night.

A Slovak court has once against put the spotlight on the communist era past of ANO leader Andrej Babiš. It’s verdict scrapping past rulings that cleared his name of being a secret police agent comes just over a week ahead of Czech elections.

An exhibition about the famous Tugendhat Villa by Mies van der Rohe is currently on display in the City of Prague Museum. The travelling exhibition on the history of the UNESCO landmark was prepared by the Villa Tugendhat Study and Documentation Centre and has already made 25 stops around the world, including the Royal Institute of British Architects in London, or the Bohemian National Hall in Manhattan.

Recently, concrete barriers were added around parts of the Old Town Square to prevent or block vehicles which could be used in a terrorist attack. There is no question about the prudence of the move but few would call the barriers “attractive”. The Prague Institute of Planning and Development is one of the bureaux looking for a better long-term solution.

Czech Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka and other members of the government as well as the opposition have condemned Czech President Miloš Zeman’s rejection of EU sanctions against Russia. The head of state told the Council of Europe on Tuesday that, in his view, sanctions were not working and called Russia’s annexation of Crimea “irreversible”.

The environment group Greenpeace has weighed into a political row over the extraction of the valuable lithium ore in the Czech Republic. It says the country risks getting seriously short changed under the current mining royalty rules.

Czech President Miloš Zeman on Tuesday addressed a session of the Council of Europe and took hard-hitting questions on issues of human rights versus economic diplomacy, the Czech stand on migration, and his opposition to sanctions against Russia.