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In the 1950's the communist regimes of Central and Eastern Europe saw the Church as a threat, the result was many priests spending time in jail. For many believers these were martyrs but the opening of the archives of the communist era secret police is shedding new light on priests and their relationshop to the secret police. Anca Dragu reports from Bratislava on allegations a prominent Roman Catholic Archibishop cooperated with Czechoslovakia's communist era secret police.

At least a third of Nepal's 29 million inhabitants live below the poverty line, unable to afford medical treatment. But a new clinic just opened in Kathmandu hopes to make a difference. The International Human Diastyle Free Clinic was created by Czechs and Slovaks who visited the country as tourists and wanted to do something for Nepals' poor.

More and more students are living and studying abroad - at least for a short period of time. They go seeking experience of a a different culture, study at a foreign university, and to meet new friends and learn another language. And many of them are finding these things in Slovenia.

The world's first baby rhinoceros - born through artificial insemination - is doing well in Budapest Zoo. The story behind this birth probably has some parallels in the human world. The baby's parents had been together so long their relationship had become platonic.

Slovenia recently deployed the largest army formation in its history to the troubled Serbian province of Kosovo. It's a historic mission for the small country, in more ways than one.

The Czech daily Lidove Noviny recently published details of a little-known footnote in Cold War history; browsing through the archives of Czechoslovakia's communist-era secret police or StB, the paper discovered that among the foreign journalists regularly followed on his trips to Prague was one Frederick Forsyth. Today known as the best-selling author of such classics as the Day of the Jackal and the Odessa File, back in the early 1960s Frederick Forsyth was a young journalist based in Berlin. Rob Cameron called the novelist at his home in Hertfordshire,

On Wednesday Serbia's parliament overwhelmingly rejected a United Nations proposal on the future status of Kosovo. Under the plan drafted by UN special envoy Martti Ahtisaari, Kosovo will get some delf-rule but not full independence. Further talks between Serbs and Kosovars would be held later this month but the Ahtisaari plan has already stirred the political scene in Slovakia with state officials unable to issue a common stance. As a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council, Slovakia is one of the countries that will vote on the Kosovo

Poland's President Lech Kaczynski wants the martial law leader Wojciech Jaruzelski to be degraded from general to private. A bill, now being drafted in the President's Office focuses on the authors of the 1981 martial law which crushed Solidarity, the first free trade union in the then communist bloc, and claimed the lives of dozens if not hundreds of Poles.

A work by the famous art nouveau painter Alfons Mucha hangs serenely in the Grand restaurant of the hotel Thermia Palace in Piestany about one hour from the Slovak capital Bratislava. 'Be greeted, the Blessed Spring of Health' -as it's called - was stolen seven years ago and damaged by the thieves. Its restoration has taken a lot of hard work.

Slovenia is taking its first steps towards seriously limiting where people can smoke. With general public approval, new legislation restricting tobacco is almost certain to pass.