2013-09-30T09:29:47+02:00 Radio Prague http://radio.cz/en urn:uuid:fdb8deff-c1a7-57c4-bb31-9dac3f10d41c 2013-09-30T09:29:47+02:00

A flood protection system at Prague Zoo should be extended within the next three years, the city’s first deputy mayor Jiří Vávra said at an event marking the 82nd anniversary of the institution’s opening. According to an analysis that Mr. Vávra presented, it is possible to erect barriers around the zoo without causing greater flood damage to other spots in the Czech capital. The report was commissioned after flooding in June that badly affected lower parts of the zoo, which had been devastated during severe floods in 2002. This year’s damages are expected to exceed CZK 100 million.

urn:uuid:18854061-ae4c-588d-a36f-87463aa644af 2013-09-30T09:29:47+02:00

Monday is the 75th anniversary of the signing of the Munich Agreement allowing the Nazis to annex Czechoslovakia’s Sudetenland, border areas chiefly inhabited by ethnic Germans. The deal was agreed on September 29 1938 but actually signed in the early hours of September 30 by the leaders of the UK, France, Germany and Italy. Czechoslovakia was not represented at the talks and considered the deal a betrayal on the part of its nominal allies the UK and France. Six months later the Nazis took over the whole of Bohemia and Moravia.

urn:uuid:c62048b9-5ba6-50c5-b988-fb9647fc3e9f 2013-09-30T09:29:47+02:00

The Czech Republic’s biggest health insurer VZP plans to seek a loan of CZK 2.5 billion from the Ministry of Health, the former’s director Zdeněk Kabátek said on a Czech Television debate show on Sunday. Mr. Kabátek said that the minister of health, Martin Holcát, had already expressed support for such a loan, which would fill a gap in VZP’s budget for this year. The insurer’s director also said that it planned to buy the controversial website IZIP, via which it communicates with its clients, for CZK 59 million. At present VZP spends CZK 72 million every year on the site’s services.

urn:uuid:4605fecd-f04c-589d-8d66-d2e0b93b22b2 2013-09-29T21:30:10+02:00

VZP plans to seek a loan of CZK 2.5 billion from the Ministry of Health to fill a gap in its budget, the health insurer’s director said on Sunday. | A flood protection system at Prague Zoo should be extended within the next three years, according to a city official. | Tomáš Berdych has been beaten in the final of tennis’s Thailand Open in Bangkok.

urn:uuid:c9c65e92-4a61-53d6-b850-89f5c44e8d61 2013-09-28T21:30:09+02:00

People in the Czech Republic have marked the day of St. Wenceslas, the country’s patron saint. | A group of ultra nationalists demonstrated in Prague on Saturday against the “decay” of the Czech Republic. | The Czech women’s tennis number one, Petra Kvitová, has won her second title of the year in Tokyo.

urn:uuid:1941241b-986a-57f1-acdc-9a77e1d79a3c 2013-09-28T02:01:00+02:00

Hello and welcome to another edition of SoundCzech Radio Prague’s Czech language course in which you can learn new phrases with the help of song lyrics. Today’s song is by Hana Zagorová and is called Spěchám –the word to listen out for today.

urn:uuid:32ff94f5-4db9-5e53-adba-079056830fb2 2013-09-28T02:01:00+02:00

Monday marks the 75th anniversary of the Munich Agreement which granted Nazi Germany large parts of Czechoslovakia, inhabited mostly by ethnic Germans. A prelude to the Second World War, the deal forged by Germany, Italy, France and the UK dealt a final blow to pre-war Czechoslovakia whose decision to accept the agreement rather than defend the country’s integrity against Nazi expansion deeply demoralized the society. Does the Munich trauma still affect Czechs today? And what lessons can be drawn from what happened in Munich 75 years ago? In this edition of Czech History, I discuss these and other issues with Matěj Sputný, a historian of Institute of Contemporary History of the Czech Academy of Sciences.

urn:uuid:ae21e5e2-4dce-5dd3-90ad-9160486df0d5 2013-09-28T02:01:00+02:00

Today in Mailbox: Listening to Radio Prague, Radio Prague’s signature tune, our “My Czech Story” competition, monthly “mystery Czech” quiz. Listeners/readers quoted: Jayanta Chakrabarty, Syed Khizar Hayat Shah, Valery Luhouski, Hans Verner Lollike, Soutik Hati, Chun-quan Meng, Charles Konecny.

urn:uuid:d94c22ab-e081-5634-a418-c8ed5a1cdf7f 2013-09-27T19:41:07+02:00

One of the key defendants in David Rath’s corruption case, Kateřina Pancová, has been released from police custody. | Prague mayor Tomáš Hudeček has said that the city’s transportation company may face a financial collapse within six months. | Amnesty International study : more than a third of Czech arms exports are sold to undemocratic countries.

urn:uuid:e112f3e9-e1ce-5d83-b2e0-cb5aca7288ce 2013-09-27T16:18:17+02:00

This Friday sees the start of the International Festival of Outdoor Films in Ostrava, the largest festival of its kind in the Czech Republic focussing on adventure, travel and extreme sports. This year, the travelling festival will visit a total of 43 towns and cities in the Czech Republic, neighbouring Slovakia and also Russia.

urn:uuid:8a7b34a4-6aa2-5c64-9c3f-d8e0f48f5f03 2013-09-27T15:32:06+02:00

The Czech Republic is facing what doctors describe as a critical shortage of child psychiatrists. Although the government is taking steps to address the problem, children in need of care now spend months waiting for an appointment.

urn:uuid:bb52d7fb-3716-5418-bfe1-10b963e80bc0 2013-09-27T15:31:41+02:00

In Business News this Friday: Distiller Stock Spirits will begin trading on the London Stock Market next month; Plzen’s Škoda Electric is expanding production; more and more Czechs are building their own homes; Prague’s mayor warns that Prague’s public transit company could face bankruptcy; operators of one of the country’s most popular ski hills will reportedly raise prices this season.

urn:uuid:2028b914-61ec-5a42-a666-3d92fb6a8f9b 2013-09-26T19:52:32+02:00

The EU’s Court of Justice has rejected a lawsuit against the Czech Republic and other countries over their VAT rules for travel agents. | The Czech central bank has kept its key interest rate at a record low of 0.05 percent. | The CEO of Prague’s transit authority has stepped down over disagreements with the firms’ board of supervisors.

urn:uuid:cd29fa48-0275-5d03-9c2f-821d89fc5410 2013-09-26T16:29:25+02:00

Doctor Jan Trachta is a pediatric surgeon who has spent the last five years working for Doctors Without Borders (MSF). This week he was back in Prague for the launch of his first book Tichý dech in which he shares his experiences from field missions in the Congo and Haiti. He visited Radio Prague’s studio this week to talk about his life and work.

urn:uuid:de1a928a-ad3f-508f-94ca-552a39b5d06c 2013-09-26T15:21:56+02:00

The Next Wave festival of independent theater and art is celebrating its 20th anniversary this year. Starting on Thursday, new and established performance groups and independent artists will show their works in Prague, Brno and Pardubice during the 12-day festival. The festival’s director, Jakub Matějka, spoke about some of the highlights for this year.

urn:uuid:f479f9d9-b545-513a-9859-c7a5e5915a5d 2013-09-26T15:21:56+02:00

For the first time Prague has just played host to the European Union Contest for Young Scientists (EUCYS), a prestigious science fair and competition that takes place each year. The Czech capital brought together some of the brightest young minds in science and technology, at a time of growing concern at the numbers of young Czechs deserting scientific subjects for the humanities. Radio Prague spoke to Martin Samek from the Faculty of Electrical Engineering at the Czech Technical University in Prague.

urn:uuid:3d7c4a64-2ae7-55cb-aeb9-407552be62e9 2013-09-25T21:30:10+02:00

The interim government has approved its state budget proposal for 2014. | Czech President Miloš Zeman will not take part in the U.N. General Assembly meeting in New York. | Legendary footballer Josef “Pepi” Bican has been named to the Czech Football Hall of Fame.

urn:uuid:21080b5a-4eb9-52c1-b54c-155ce94fc4e3 2013-09-25T16:31:07+02:00

The Social Democrats top all election surveys ahead of the upcoming early general election. The party, which has spent the last seven years in opposition, promises voters economic growth; they want to icrease government spending and invest more into health care, education and other fields. All this is to be paid for by, among other things, higher taxes. In this edition of Marketplace, I discuss the Social Democrat’s economic policies with the party’s economic expert and shadow finance minister Jan Mládek.

urn:uuid:ab34b9c4-fb79-556f-aac2-395f44f85d94 2013-09-25T15:58:15+02:00

The Czech Republic now has a telephone hotline for families of missing children, with a Europe-wide phone number, in partnership with a European network working to help find missing or runaway children and support their families. This week, the non-profit organization Lost Child (Ztracené dítě) received certification to use the 116 000 hotline, which already exists in 22 other European countries.

urn:uuid:e83705e4-e94a-5932-abb7-3a9fc2f553ca 2013-09-25T15:58:15+02:00

The legendary footballer Josef “Pepi” Bican, was inducted in the Czech Football Association’s Hall of Fame on Wednesday, on the 100th anniversary of his birth. Officially recognized as the most prolific scorer in the history of the game, Pepi Bican is said to have scored an incredible 4,500 goals in his career.