ICE - special | All stories

The spectacular sights and sounds of Indian cinema came to the Czech Republic last night, as a week-long festival of Bollywood films opened in Prague. Over the next seven days, the audience will be treated to films spanning five decades of Indian cinema, covering everything from serious political comment to the traditional all-singing, all-dancing Bollywood extravaganza. The festival is supported by Prague's Indian Embassy. We asked Ambassador PS Raghavan what Bollywood meant to him:

Earlier this week, Poland marked the 20th anniversary of the murder of pro-Solidarity priest Father Jerzy Popieluszko. The Polish Parliament unanimously adopted a motion honouring his memory, saying that he had 'courageously defended the ideals of truth, freedom and justice. The resolution added that 'his death was one of the last acts of the state terror aimed at its own citizens in the long chain of post-war history'.

Budapest's famous zoo will soon see the birth of the world's first white rhino baby from an artificially inseminated mother. Yes after many attempts the Zoo's only female white rhino, Lulu, is finally pregnant - good news since rhinos belong to a highly endangered species. Endre Soós is the chief veterinarian at the Budapest Zoo:

The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) has released the results of a survey conducted in June to test the effects pollution has on our health. Fourteen EU Environment Ministers agreed to give blood samples to determine how many and what kind of man-made chemicals are in their bodies. For the Czech and Slovak ministers, the results were shocking.

Many people in Slovakia have been asked in a poll if they're satisfied with their social status. One of the questions was also focused on poverty. Problem is, Slovakia has no official definition of poverty.

The 39th Borstnik theatre festival opened in Maribor on Friday. Named after actor Ignacij Borstnik, the founder of modern Slovene theatre and the art of acting, it is Slovenia's central theatre festival, hosting the best performances from the season's domestic theatre every year.

One of this year's Nobel Prize winners in chemistry is Avram Hershko - an Israeli scientist born in Hungary. His discovery sets out a new chapter in degrading proteins, which play a crucial role in the curing process of a number of neurological or tumour diseases.

After Charles Taylor, accused of gun-running, war crimes and leading an army of child soldiers, was forced to resign as president of Liberia last year, the world media paid little attention to the West African country. Its citizens have yet to recover from years of civil war, social unrest, and poverty. A Prague-based organisation now hopes to come to their aid.

A new campaign urging Poles to up their spending on humanitarian aid to developing countries has been launched in Warsaw under the auspices of the United Nations Development Programme and the Polish Foreign Ministry. The "Time to Help Others" campaign hopes to stimulate public awareness of the needs of other nations and make Poles realize that they are much better off than 150 countries around the world.

Since Slovenia's independence in 1991, the center-left party (LDS) has dominated national politics. Their nearly 12-year streak (with only brief interruptions) came to an end during last Sunday's parliamentary elections, when the center-right party, the SDS, led by Janez Jansa, swept to victory. Although final, official results are still pending, all signs are pointing to Janez Jansa being tipped as Slovenia's next prime minister. We recently spoke with Mr. Jansa about the election results and the future of the country: