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Finance Minister Andrej Babiš has reason to celebrate – by all accounts the year will end on the highest budget surplus in the country’s modern history. However contrary to expectations the government has not drafted a balanced or even surplus budget for next year and the minister has been accused of making “unrealistic projections” that would guarantee a good result.

The Czech government has approved a proposed amendment to the law which would enable gay and lesbian couples to adopt their partner’s biological child. The proposal was supported by the ruling Social Democrats and ANO, but opposed by the Christian Democrats who see it as a threat to the traditional family model. I asked one of the authors of the draft, Deputy Minister for Human Rights Martina Štěpánková, to explain its significance.

The Czech president’s spokesman has confirmed the head of state is considering presenting Auschwitz survivor George Brady not with a state honour but a separate award as a “gesture of good will”. The move is an attempt to defuse a widening scandal after the culture minister charged that Brady, his uncle, was struck off the list of this year’s award recipients as punishment for the minister’s meeting with the Dalai Lama.

A scandal has broken out in connection with Friday’s award-giving ceremony at Prague Castle, that threatens to blight the official celebrations of Czechoslovak Independence Day on October 28. Culture Minister Daniel Herman has accused the president of having threatened him that, if he met with the Dalai Lama, his uncle, Auschwitz survivor George Brady, would be taken off the nominees’ list for a state award. The claim –and Brady’s absence on the list - have sparked widespread criticism and demands for an explanation.

The Czech Republic is facing the uncomfortable position of being in the middle a major tug of war between Washington and Moscow after a Russian citizen suspected of a major hacking operation in the United States was detained in Prague.

Masaryk is the name of a new Czech, Slovak, and German co-production focusing on dramatic years in the life of Jan Masaryk, the son of Czechoslovakia’s first president, who served as ambassador to Britain. The story, directed by Julius Ševčík, focusses primarily on the years leading up to WWII, most notably the signing of the Munich Agreement in which Czechoslovakia was abandoned by its allies and large parts of the country were ceded to Nazi Germany.

A visit by the Dalai Lama to Prague this week has turned into a hot political issue. A joint statement by key politicians, reassuring Beijing of the country’s continued pro-China orientation, has evoked a storm of protests and accusations of “uncalled for, shameful servility“.

US manufacturing giant General Electric has signed an agreement to design and build a new general of turbojet aircraft engines in the Czech Republic. Apart from the 500 new jobs that are promised, Czech politicians have highlighted the deal as an indicator of where the country wants to be with high paid jobs backed up by research and close ties with universities.

Just days after the second round of Senate elections, there are increasing calls – including from the president – for the upper chamber of the Czech Parliament to be abolished. Supporters, meanwhile, argue that it is an important safeguard of democracy. But is the abolition of the Senate a serious possibility?

A new book of stunning photographs from Space by former NASA astronaut Leroy Chiao published by the Zdeněk Sklenář Gallery was launched in Prague this week. Chiao’s photos, shot in orbit some 400 kilometres above the Earth, were taken from four separate missions between 1994 and 2005. On the occasion of the book launch, Czech Radio’s Miroslav Krupička asked the astronaut about how the idea for the book, due to also come out in English and Chinese, came together after he and Sklenář met.