Real Estate Czech Republic

“I will definitely respect (the decision of) the party’s bodies,” Cunek said.

Cunek is to defend himself before the KDU-CSL national committee on Tuesday. KDU-CSL senators called on Cunek to resign over his dubious family finances today.

However, Cunek said he was not going to resign on his own. He said he would continue to work as senator if he left the cabinet.

Cunek admitted that the case of social benefit abuse is more sensitive than his previous corruption scandal.

Earlier this year, Cunek was investigated over the suspicion that he accepted a 500,000-crown bribe five years ago.

He said Cunek who is suspected of abuse of social benefits had already been informed of the call.

“The group of KDU-CSL senators calls on its member Jiri Cunek to resign as first deputy prime minister of the Czech Republic, local development minister as well as KDU-CSL chairman,” Kalbac quoted from the group’s resolution.

He said the resolution was adopted briefly before Cunek said at a press conference that he did not abuse social benefits in the 1990s. Cunek said he only managed a part of the 3.5 million crowns he had in his accounts.

Kalbac would not specify the reasons for which the group approved the resolution, he only said “the current situation is intolerable.”

Cunek told reporters at an extraordinary press conference that he received state social support in compliance with the valid laws, according to which the applicant’s income and not his savings were taken into consideration.

“I do not feel it as an ethical failure,” Cunek said.

He thereby reacted to voices from his party and from the coalition partners, the Civic Democrats (ODS) and the Greens, saying that his behaviour was morally unacceptable though he probably did not violate law.

Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek (ODS) today clearly said Cunek cannot remain in the government if he fails to quickly and credibly refute the suspicion that he abused social benefits.

The bill is yet to be passed by the Senate and signed by the head of state.

Under the bill, distrainers will have to submit to the ministry, at its request, written and oral explanation of their performance.

The ministry will also be able to regularly check distrainer’s offices and their files.

The ministry will also carry out the checks in reaction to complaints lodged by individuals and legal entities.

Justice Minister Jiri Pospisil said previously that in some cases private distrainers act too toughly or carry out distraint upon people who are not the actual debtors and are not under distraint.

Czech diplomacy has been striving for the visa abolition since 1997 when Canada re-introduced visas for Czechs, after lifting them for a short period, in reaction to Czech Romanies’ seeking asylum in Canada en masse.

Prague took a counter-measure and re-introduced visas for Canadians as well in 2001, but abolished them after the Czech Republic’s EU entry in 2004.

Though Canada has concluded that the Czech Republic now meets the criteria for visa-free relations, it can re-assess the decision any time, Schwarzenberg noted.

The opposition Social Democrats (CSSD) challenged the new measure saying it allowed for political censorship.

Martinu said the measure was to reduce the number of cases in which the police start the investigation, but a state attorney halts it soon afterwards based on lack of evidence.

He said 13,000 out of 126,000 police investigations were halted by an attorney in 2006, which was more than 10 percent.

The information on the anti-corruption police unit was released last week by the daily Pravo that cited Police Deputy President Jiri Houba.

Pravo wrote that the same model would also be used in the work of other police units, or the anti-drug centre (NPC) and the organised crime squad (UOOZ).

The bill is yet to be approved by the Senate and signed by President Vaclav Klaus.

The legislation will also introduce the possibility of “electronic prescriptions.”

Health Minister Tomas Julinek (Civic Democrats, ODS) told reporters that the bill would constitute a new group of medicines that could be sold without a prescription but with certain limits, for instance contraceptives.

The patient will have to fulfil some conditions and show his ID to receive the medicines, Julinek added.

However, only a later regulation will specify what kinds of medicines would enter this group.

Julinek …

Either the military will accept the Pandurs from the Steyr company and gradually remove their shortcomings, or it will refuse them over the violated conditions of the contract. The third possibility is that Steyr will not deliver the APCs on time, Bartak said.

Bartak said the situation would be clear within three weeks.

Steyr is to supply a total of 199 APCs worth over 23 billion crowns, which would be the most expensive contract of the Czech military.

The military was to obtain the first 17 APCs in November, but Steyr is unlikely to manage the supply in time, the daily Lidove noviny (LN) writes today.

The military police discovered that somebody was stealing fuel at the Kbely airport in spring and asked the civilian police to investigate the case in the beginning of October.

Chief-of-staff Vlastimil Picek ordered stock-taking of fuel at Kbely in connection with the case.

The detention of the two Kbely airport employees is one of several recent cases in the military investigated by the police.

The anti-corruption police squad is investigating two cases in which major general in reserve Ivo Zboril, former Presidential Military Office head, was reportedly involved when working for the Defence Ministry.

Now, are you sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin… Once upon a time, in aland far, far, away, a group of celebrities met to read their favouritefairytales to children who had gathered to listen. On Tuesday night, formerPresident Vaclav Havel was joined by musicians, sportspeople, andfilmmakers at an event called ‘From My Favourite Children’s Book…’ Theevening included readings from well-known Czech children’s classics, aswell as songs, and stories written by Mr. Havel himself. This mix of musicand fairytale seemed to go down a treat with the hundreds of childrenpresent. Vaclav and Dagmar Havel, …