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Czech Prime Minister Petr Nečas is on a four-day working visit to Russia. On Monday, Mr Nečas met the head of the Russian government, Dmitry Medvedev for talks on economic cooperation including a Russian bid to expand one of the Czech Republic’s nuclear power plants. Later on Monday, the Czech prime minister is scheduled to meet with Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, in Sochi.

Police in Brno have said an American man wanted in connection of the murder of a Czech family in Brno has been arrested after stepping off a flight from Vienna to Washington D.C. Twenty-year-old Kevin Dahlgren was being sought by police in both the Czech Republic and abroad after four bodies were discovered in the house in Brno where he was staying. According to Czech media reports, the victims were relatives.

Members of the Prague assembly on Thursday dismissed Mayor Bohuslav Svoboda as well as two other Civic Democrat councillors in a vote Thursday that sees the Civic Democrats head into the opposition for the first time in more than 20 years. The collapse of the council at City Hall was prompted earlier this week by TOP 09, whose members said they could no longer work with their partners on key issues. The now former mayor charged that that was only an excuse for the party to shift gears ahead of next year’s elections.

A Czech brewery is taking the country’s leading consumer magazine to court over tests which detected high levels of mould in one of its brews. The Svijany brewery questions the accuracy of the findings, as additional testing did not find increased levels of mycotoxins in its beer. In an email leaked to the press, the brewery’s manager also says that government subsidies for the magazine should be cut.

A controversy sparked by the Czech president’s reluctance to appoint a university professor seems to have been resolved. Miloš Zeman’s refusal to confer the title on Martin C. Putna, a literary historian and vocal critic of his, caused an outcry in the academic community and beyond. However on Wednesday, the president and the education minister struck a deal: Mr Putna will after all be appointed professor. But he will receive his decree from the minister rather than from the head of state himself.

Talks are continuing at Prague City Hall between former coalition partners the Civic Democrats and TOP 09. On Monday, the latter quit the 11-member council, citing concerns over the administration of key areas, including financing, as well as problematic projects such as the overpriced Blanka tunnel. TOP 09 have since offered the Civ Dems a new agreement, one that, however, offers the latter fewer seats on the council and sees them lose the post of mayor.

After last year’s methanol affair in the Czech Republic, the police redoubled efforts in uncovering bootleg liquor. A week ago, it was confirmed Tuesday, they found three secret sites and uncovered close to one million litres of undeclared alcohol. Earlier searches at different warehouses around the country missed the hidden chambers as they were sealed underground beneath metre-thick concrete.

One of the Czech Republic’s best known soccer clubs has just escaped bankruptcy and expulsion from the first division. In fact, for a brief period on Monday it appeared it really was curtains for Baník Ostrava. But how have the 2004 league champions found themselves in such dire straits? And what does the future hold for the club?

The Czech president, Miloš Zeman, has caused an outcry by saying he will not confer the title of professor on a Charles University academic. Czech heads of state normally just rubberstamp such decisions, and Mr. Zeman’s position on the appointment of Martin C. Putna is wholly unprecedented. The president has not been entirely clear on the reasons – but says he objected to a placard the academic carried in a gay pride march.

Earlier this week, hockey fans hoped that the Czech national team had finally found its legs in a 7-0 drubbing of Norway. But that was as good as things would get. Although the Czechs avoided the embarrassment of an early exit and made the quarterfinal, they again faced tournament’s biggest surprise this year, the Swiss, and were defeated.