CZECH TELEGRAPH

Czech Premier cancels higher taxation of employee benefits

3. 3. 2010 / Fabiano Golgo

Czech President Václav Klaus was in a special 40-minute primetime interview on TV Nova, reacting to the heat provoked by a planned public transportation strike in protest against the taxing and loss of some employee benefits. In a day when the lower house of parliament and union leaders discussed and a new amendment emerged, Klaus warned he would not sign it, if passed later this week by the Senate. He said that unions are legitimate, but should fight employers, not the State.

The president also expressed his sympathy for Pope Benedikt XVI and his conservative ideas; confirmed his stand against a mandatory vaccination for anyone against the so-called swine flu, his distrust of the Lisabon Treaty and the EU and his support for the Czech Supreme Court's decision to prohibit the ultranationalist and neonacist Worker's Party (DS - Dělnická strana).

Days after Britské listy published an article about the harrassment of Czech drivers in German territory , former prime minister and leader of the right wing Civic Democrats (ODS), Mirek Topolánek, criticized the German authorities during an official visit to Brussels.

The Czech Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes' recently elected director -- historian Jiří Pernes -- will not lose his position, after media pressure when it emerged that he frequented a Marxist-Leninist institute of higher learning during the previous regime and was considered by the Czech communist-era secret police, the StB, as a potential collaborator. The previous director of the institution, Pavel Žáček, who was fired for bad administration, was accused in some reports of being behind the leaking of controversial information about his successor.

929 Czech companies and individuals filed bankruptcy just these first two months of 2010, according to the Czech Credit Bureau. 500 companies and individuals went bankrupt in February alone. There was a growth of 229 percent i personal bankruptcies in comparison to last year.

Deputy Prime Minister of Czech Republic Martin Barták paid an unannounced visit to Afghanistan on Tuesday and met with President Hamid Karzai. They discussed the possibility of sending Afghani police and military personnel to be trained in the Czech Republic.

Czech journalist Milan Šíma and photographer Jan Šibík were held for three days by Iranian authorities after having their camera and other belongings captured by the police, to prevent them from doing a report about an Iranian lawyer who is defending some of the imprisoned for protesting the last presidential elections results in that country.

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