Current Affairs | All stories

Many Czech movie critics have been up in arms this week over the country’s nomination for the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film. While the Czech Film Academy’s choice was the highly regarded drama Burning Bush, it doesn’t meet Oscar criteria and the Czech Republic will in the end be represented by the poorly-received new picture by Jiří Menzel.

The number of Czech companies registered in tax havens has been steadily increasing during the past decade. Only in the last five years, offshore companies won public tenders in this country worth more than 150 billion crowns, according to analysis by the advocacy group Transparency International and the consulting company Bisnode. On Tuesday, they presented their findings about the links between offshore companies, public tenders and Czech politicians.

The wheat beer Primátor Weizenbeer has been named the world’s best beer in an international tasting competition. The Czech brew, produced by the east Bohemian Primátor brewery, became the overall winner of the 2013 World Beer Awards, and was also awarded as the best wheat beer. Praised for its balanced fruity taste, great body and spicy finish, Primátor Weizenbeer has been a pioneer in reviving a particular style of beer that has nearly died out in the Czech Republic. I spoke to exports manager of the Primátor Brewery, Romana Jansová.

Czech President Miloš Zeman is in Israel on a four-day visit. On Monday, Mr Zeman met with top Israeli officials including the head of state, Shimon Peres. But even before the start of his visit, Mr Zeman caused an uproar when he said the Czech embassy should move from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

It’s just three weeks now until ballot boxes open across the country, with Czechs going to the polls in early elections to the lower house of parliament. For the past four years the Czech NGO People in Need has been holding mock elections in the country’s secondary schools; this year more than 50,000 pupils voted in a two-day election held in over 400 schools.

Václav Klaus is known for his eurosceptic views. But now the former Czech president has made perhaps his strongest statement yet. In a new book due to hit the bookshelves next week, he says the European Union is contributing towards everything bad in Czech politics, society and the economy – and calls for the country to pull out of the EU all together.

A new exhibition at Prague’s Academy of Sciences marks the 100th anniversary of the birth of Otto Wichterle, the great Czech chemist who invented modern soft contact lenses in the mid 1950s. While a close collaborator later moved to the West, Wichterle stayed in Czechoslovakia, despite being persecuted by the Communists. He never made a cent from his invention, as the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences had sold his patent to a U.S. firm. However, he didn’t mind not profiting personally, says Professor František Rypáček, who knew him.

President Miloš Zeman continues to dominate approval ratings of Czech politicians. A recent poll by the CVVM agency has found that 48 percent of Czechs trust the president, down somewhat from the agency’s previous survey but still ahead of Senator Tomio Okamura in second place. However, Mr Zeman’s and Mr Okamura’s parties – the Citizens’ Rights Party and Dawn, respectively – fare much worse in election surveys. But why is the president so popular? That’s a question I put to commentator Erik Best.

The Czech Republic has lost one of its most highly-regarded lyricists and songwriters, Zdeněk Rytíř, who worked with many of the biggest names on the Czech music scene for more than 40 years. The 69-year-old hit-maker died on Tuesday after suffering a heart attack.

October 1st has been designated as International Day of Older Persons by the UN General Assembly. This year Czech NGOs are using the occasion to raise awareness of the vast divide between the life that elderly people want and the reality they often have to come to terms with. A campaign called Live at Home Longer is targeted both at elderly people and their families who make life-shaping decisions for them.