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The President of the European Court of Justice Vassilios Skuris will be visiting the Czech Republic from May 8 to 11, a spokesman of the court said on Wednesday. Mr. Skuris will be meeting with Czech Justice Minister Daniela Kovářová and is scheduled to receive an honorary doctorate degree from Brno’s Masaryk University. Last year, the President of the European Court of Human Rights Jean-Paul Costa visited the Czech Republic. He also received an honorary doctorate in Brno.

Lebanon’s Hezbollah movement has accused the Czech Republic of helping Israel's intelligence in running its agents inside Lebanon, the daily Haaretz reported on Wednesday quoting Lebanese press. The Czech embassy in Beirut reportedly granted entry visa in 2008 to an agent, Abu Jureish, who was then trained in the Czech Republic. Last year, he was one of 20 Lebanese nationals arrested on charges of spying for Israel.

The Czech Foreign Ministry declined to comment on the issue. The Czech Republic is considered one of Israel’s closest allies within the European Union; the two countries closely cooperate in military, scientific and other areas.

In related news, Czech Justice Minister Daniela Kovářová got stranded at Lisbon airport in Portugal on Wednesday. Mrs. Kovářová was returning to Prague via Lisbon from a trip to Salvador, where she attended a UN conference. The minister of justice said that she will not be able to return before Thursday. She added that she will have to cancel a meeting of EU justice ministers in Luxemburg to take place on Friday, along with other engagements on her agenda.

Prague’s official website, www.praha.eu, was ranked second on a worldwide list of city websites published by the American internet research association The e-Governance Institute. Prague’s city website placed best among all European cities, with Seoul top of the ladder. A spokesman for Prague town hall said on Wednesday that the number of visitors to the website has significantly grown in recent months. Currently, the website, which contains information both for residents of Prague and tourists, sees about 600,000 visits a month. The e-Governance Institute’s list is the only assessment of city websites not based merely on design criteria. It is compiled in association with the United Nations.

The European Union is again going to call on Canada to drop visa requirements from visitors from the Czech Republic, Romania and Bulgaria. The bloc’s foreign affairs chief, Catherine Ashton, said the issue would be raised at a Canada-EU summit at the start of May. Speaking in Brussels, Baroness Ashton said it was not a matter of bilateral relations between Canada and the three countries, but a matter of EU-Canada relations. She said the EU’s aim was clear: visa-free travel to Canada for all its citizens. Ottawa introduced a visa regime for Czechs in July 2009 after a rise in the number of Czech Romany asylum seekers in Canada. It had already imposed the same restriction on people from Romania and Bulgaria, which both joined the European Union in 2007.

Prime Minister Jan Fischer will be leaving Czech politics after May’s general elections. The head of the caretaker government said on Tuesday he was nominated for vice-president of the London-based European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. The 59-year old former statistician should assume the post by the beginning of September.

The 17th Days of European Film festival started on Thursday evening in Prague. The festival offers a selection of films from European Union countries or countries lining up to join the EU. This year, 38 films are being screened from 28 countries. The festival continues in Prague until April 28 before transferring to the country’s second city, Brno, and other Czech towns and cities. These include Boskovice, Olomouc, Plzeň and Uherské Hradišté.

Czech soldiers will be helping to provide security in Estonia on the occasion of an informal meeting of NATO member states’ foreign ministers. The 22 Czech soldiers, who are all members of the army’s biological and nuclear specialists unit, will be traveling to Estonia on Sunday, ahead of the summit which is to take place in Tallinn on April 22 and 23. The Czech experts will be checking the location of the NATO meeting for poisonous and nuclear substances. In the past, Czech soldiers have worked in security and anti-terrorism units at numerous international events, such as the Olympic Games in Athens in 2004 and NATO summits across Europe.

The Czech Republic will receive some 722 million crowns, or nearly 40 million US dollars, from EU funds to improve the education of Czech health care workers, Health Minister Dana Jurásková said on Monday. The funds will pay for the education of some 39,000 doctors, nurses and other medical staff, the minister added. The ministry will now determine the details of the project and organize individual courses that will be launched in May and finish in April 2013. The ministry also welcomed the fact that it will be able to use the funds to pay the doctors and other health workers attending the courses who until now had to cover much of the expenses themselves.

Czech Foreign Minister Jan Kohout said he expected a new anti-missile defence shield in Europe to be a NATO project with Russia invited to take part. His comments came following a longer than expected meeting on Thursday with his US counterpart Hilary Clinton. Mr. Kohout said the Czech Republic was interested in taking part in an anti-missile shield but would have to wait for a new government following elections at the end for a clear stance on how this could happen. He added that it was important for Prague that NATO gave priority to the project. The two foreign ministers also discussed Czech involvement in Afghanistan and the chances of increasing the existing Czech contingent by another 55 from the current 535. That increase has not so far been cleared by parliament.