Loading...
Prague Castle is hosting an international conference on 20 years of Czech membership in the EU. Addressing the gathering, Prime Minister Petr Fiala said that in the past two decades the EU had significantly contributed to Czechia’s security and prosperity and the country had shown itself to be a reliable member, ready to take on its share of responsibility and defend European values. Mr. Fiala also spoke of the need to help Ukraine defend its sovereignty and expressed support for EU enlargement to the Western Balkans, Moldova and Ukraine, which he said would become an essential security guarantee in the years to come.
Addressing the gathering, President Petr Pavel said Czechia should adopt the euro in order to become a first-league player in Europe. Pavel indirectly criticized the government’s unwillingness to set a date for euro adoption, saying that only those countries that have not yet adopted the currency are dissatisfied with the euro.
In a video message to participants, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy thanked Czechia for actively helping Ukraine to defend itself against Russian aggression and expressed the hope that his country would one day be able to join the alliance. Europe can only be strong if no one is left out in the cold, he said.
The 20th anniversary of the country’s accession to the EU will also be marked by a gala concert at the Rudolfinum performed by the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra. The Chamber of Commerce of the Czech Republic is also planning an event on 4 April to mark the anniversary and to evaluate EU membership from a business perspective.
The government has approved changes to the pension system proposed by the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs. The proposal envisages a gradual increase in the retirement age linked to a higher life expectancy, a different basis for calculating old-age pensions, a lower indexation of pensions and a minimum pension amounting to 20 percent of the average wage. Most of the changes would affect people born after 1966. The present retirement age is 65 for both men and women.
According to Labour Minister Marian Jurečka the reform is necessary for the sustainability of the pension system. However the opposition ANO party is critical of the planned changes and has said that if it wins the 2025 general elections and gets to form a government it will abolish them. Trade unions and associations of disabled and senior citizens are also opposed to the reform.
Czechia will continue to seek compensation from Russia through diplomatic channels for the ammunition depot explosions in Vrbětice in 2014, Interior Minister Vít Rakušan said at a press briefing on Monday. The explosions killed two people and caused close to a billion crowns in damages. Martin Smolek, of the Foreign Ministry's legal and consular section, said that while there was no hope of getting Russia to take responsibility for the attack at present, the situation could change in the future.
Minister Rakušan said the police have proof that the Vrbětice explosions were carried out by members of the Russian military intelligence agency GRU, whose motive was to prevent the delivery of weapons to the places where the Russians were conducting operations.
Digitalisation will shake up the labour market in the next seven to eight years, Minister of Labour and Social Affairs Marian Jurečka told reporters. Jurecka said he expects that 300, 000 jobs will be lost because of digitization and another million positions will undergo a significant change requiring requalification. In the next 18 months the Labour Ministry wants up to 130,000 people to upgrade their competences in digital technologies. The Labour Ministry and the Labour Office have earmarked 5 billion crowns to be invested in human capital and retraining and digital education in the coming years.
Grammy-winning American singer Billie Eilish will perform in the Czech Republic in June of next year within her European tour to promote her highly anticipated third studio album HIT ME HARD AND SOFT, set for release on May 17. Eilish is scheduled to appear at Prague’s 02 Arena, which she sold out in 2019, on 1 June 2025. According to Ondřej Pojzl from the LiveNation production agency, tickets will go on sale on 3 May.
A fire warning for the entire country in the coming days, issued in connection with the warm, dry and windy weather, has led to a ban in Prague on lighting fires in high-risk places such as parks, gardens and woodland areas until midnight Thursday. The ban is intended to limit the traditional bonfires on Walpurgis or witch burning night, on Tuesday, April 30. Large events taking place under the supervision of firefighters can go ahead.
Wednesday should be clear and dry with day temperatures between 21 and 25 degrees Celsius.
Since 2008, the organization ComingOut has been working to protect the rights of LGBTQ+ folks in Russia, as a response to the many dangers and difficulties this community faces on a daily basis. Georgii Kalakutskii, a member of the queer community himself, is taking the work ComingOut is doing across Europe, including Prague, to draw attention to these issues and to build solidarity. He told me more about the discussion he is hosting on May 1 in Prague.
Join us on a trip to the Liberec Region. Our drone video will show you the region’s hilly landscape with its many castles and the iconic TV transmitter on Ještěd.
We'll hear from two extraordinary Czech women who've woven their lives into the fabric of this the vibrant city of London.
Zoologists from the Dvůr Králové Safari Park have started researching elephants in the Mkomazi National Park in Tanzania. One of the zoo’s main missions is protecting endangered and threatened wildlife species directly in their natural habitats, and this is precisely the aim of their research in Tanzania. Millions of elephants once lived throughout Africa, but today, they only number around 350,000. Ivory poachers kill eight percent of the elephant population every year, but as Michal Šťastný from the Department of Communication and International Projects at Safari Park Dvůr Králové told me, it is not only poaching that threatens the African elephants.
This e-mail is sent to you automatically according to the settings you chose. To change the settings, click here.
© 2024, Radio Prague International - the external service of Czech Radio, all rights reserved.
https://english.radio.cz, e-mail: english@radio.cz, Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Instagram
Loading...
Loading...