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Figures from the European Union’s statistics office have put Prague and the Czech Republic in the top European ten locations for murders. The EU statistical office puts the country and capital Prague in seventh place out of the 27-strong EU for the numbers of murders as a proportion of the population with a figure of three murders per 100,000 people. Prague and the rest of the country trail the EU’s murder capital, Lithuanian city Vilnius, with 8.28 murders per 100,000 and second placed Estonian capital Tallinn with 6.04 murders per 100,000 as well as the EU capital itself, Brussels, with 3.2 murders per 100,000.

Tens of billions of crowns in possible European Union funds for Czech schools, universities and research institutions continue to be at risk because European officials have still to be convinced that the Czech Republic has adequate resources to manage programmes, Czech Radio reported on Wednesday. The broadcaster quoted officials saying they were following the situation closely but believed there was still a high risk concerning the Czech situation. The Ministry of Education which is responsible for pumping these European funds shed a series of key start when the new Education Minister Josef Dobeš took charge earlier this year but the ministry says the gaps have been filled. The minister has highlighted the EU funds of up to 120 billion crowns as crucial to meet spending plans. A meeting between EU and Czech officials has been planned for the start of December.

The Social Democrat deputy chairwoman of the Senate has warned that it could reject an EU treaty onto which is attached the Czech president’s demand for an opt out from the EU’s Charter of Fundamental Rights. Senator Alena Gajdůšková highlighted the risk on Wednesday saying that the exemption was simply unacceptable because it would mean Czechs had weaker rights than other EU citizens. President Václav Klaus demanded the opt out as a condition for his signing the EU’s reforming Lisbon treaty. He said it was necessary to prevent claims from Germans expelled from the former Czechoslovakia under the Beneš decrees at the end of WWII. The treaty took effect a year ago but the opt out has still to be delivered. It could probably be attached to a new accession treaty allowing Croatia to join the EU-27. The Social Democrats gained a majority in the upper house at the last elections.

The Czech Republic will contribute 6.7 billion crowns, around 270 million euros, to the 85 billion euro loan offered to Ireland to help it overcome its ongoing financial crisis. Details of the Czech contribution were given on Sunday by deputy finance minister Tomáš Zídek following an emergency meeting of EU finance ministers in Brussels. The Czech Republic joins other non-eurozone countries, such as Britain, Denmark and Sweden, participating in the package. The help will not apparently need to be cleared by the current government or parliament on the principle of such a step already having been agreed by the previous caretaker administration of prime minister Jan Fischer. Czech eurosceptic president Václav Klaus last week raised the possibility of the Czech Republic seeking an opt out from adopting the euro, pinpointing the possibility of taking advantage of a reopening of the Lisbon treaty to insert a financial safety mechanism for eurozone countries to make such a demand.

Prime Minister Petr Nečas on Friday reacted to news the president favoured an opt-out (similar to Denmark’s or Great Britain’s) by making clear such a move was highly unlikely. Speaking to the news website iDnes, he stressed that such a step on the part of the Czech Republic would be an artificial political act, one which he considered untenable. The prime minister pointed out that it was up to the Czechs to decide when to adopt the European currency since there was no “set” deadline. The prime minister also confirmed he had received a letter from the president but refused to any discuss details.

The Czech media has reported that the country’s president, Václav Klaus, would like the government to negotiate a Czech opt-out from the 16-member eurozone, currently hit by debt crisis. The daily Mladá fronta Dnes cited two cabinet members on Thursday on condition of anonymity; the president’s spokesman did not comment. An opt-out would allow the Czech Republic to keep its crown currency even if all conditions for euro adoption were met. The country pledged to join the eurozone after becoming a member of the European Union in 2004.

Czech police are planning stepped up controls of cars with German number plates the daily Právo has reported. The move is expected to start before the holidays. Authorities have denied this is a payback for increased German controls of Czech drivers in recent months. Prague had denounced the German checks as harassment and said they were against the spirit of the European Union’s passport-free Schengen agreement. The Czech police, meanwhile, say the planned steps are aimed at countering a car theft spree across the border in Germany, allegedly involving some Czech citizens.

In this week’s Business News: Czechs discuss eurozone support; Škoda Auto comes under Brussels state aid scrutiny; windfall gains keep Czech Airlines in profit; Czechs’ purchasing power takes a hit; and Čepro fuels merger talks.

The Czech government has decided to allow foreigners to buy farmland in the country when a current exemption on EU free market rules expires in May next year. The government could have sought a further three year transition period banning such sales but was warned by the Finance Ministry of legal problems that could arise if that route was taken. Farmers’ main lobby in the country had asked for the ban to be extended saying local land is still a fraction of the price in Western Europe. Foreigners have already got around the existing ban by creating Czech companies to buy land or find local partners to do it on their behalf. Some estimates say around a third of farmland in the western Karlovy Vary region bordering Germany is foreign owned.

German President Christian Wulff has arrived in Prague for a day of talks with top Czech officials. Speaking after a meeting with President Václav Klaus, Mr Wulff again addressed a recent debate over the aftermath of WWII, saying that the crimes of Nazism against the Czechs could not be compared with the post-war expulsion of Germans from Czechoslovakia, and that the time was right for a debate to be held on the matter. Mr Klaus said following the meeting that relations between the two countries were at an historic high. Mr Wulff’s talks with the Czech president and PM are expected to focus on bilateral relations, EU matters and the outcome of the recent NATO summit in Lisbon. Two problem issues that have been highlighted by the Czech side are the restriction of the German job market for Czechs, which is to expire in May 2011, and the often humiliating road checks which Czech drivers are subjected to in Bavaria.