CCCCC AA RRRRR OOOO LL II NN N AA CC AA A RR R OO O LL II NNN N AA A CC AA A RRRRR OO O LL II NN N N AA A CC AAAAAA RR R OO O LL II NN NN AAAAAA CCCCC AA A RR R OOOO LLLLLL II NN N AA A STUDENTS' E-MAIL NEWS FROM THE CZECH REPUBLIC Charles University in Prague Faculty of Social Sciences Smetanovo nabr. 6 110 01 Prague 1 Czech Republic e-mail: CAROLINA@mbox.fsv.cuni.cz tel: (+4202) 22112252, fax: (+4202) 24810987 *-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-* C A R O L I N A No 362, Friday, February 11, 2000. FROM THE EVENTS OF THE PAST WEEK (February 2 - February 9) Czech Republic Joins Diplomatic Pressure on Vienna President Vaclav Havel and Prime Minister Milos Zeman expressed their support for the European Union's sanctions against Austria. The strongest statement from the Czech Republic after Jorg Haider's Freedom Party (FPO) joined the Austrian Government was heard from the Foreign Ministry: Prague is alarmed by the program of the new Austrian Government (which makes Czech EU membership conditional on the Czech Republic annulling the Benes Decrees and compensating expelled Sudeten Germans). In its February 7 statement the Foreign Ministry considers this posture unacceptable, because "it does not distinguish between the tens of millions of victims of the Nazi attack on Europe, in which many Austrians participated, and retribution or revenge, be it often inappropriate." "We fear that the positions of the new Government could become a very obstacle to the Czech Republic joining the EU," said ministry spokesman Ales Pospisil. Haider also said Austria would veto Czech EU membership if the Czechs' Temelin nuclear power plant begins operating. Many Czech politicians were horrified by the statements of Vaclav Klaus, chairman of the Chamber of Deputies and the Civic Democratic Party (ODS), who expressed in a letter to Austrian People's Party Chairman Wolfgang Schussel solidarity with his moves in creating a coalition government with Haider. Klaus wrote that he sympathizes with the opinion that the "EU declarartion represents an unprecedented attempt to influence the internal affairs of an independent, democratic state." David Mirejovsky/Ondrej Maly Government Introduces Visa Requirements for Russia, Belarus and Ukraine In accordance with its EU accession program, the Government February 2 instituted visa requirements for citizens of Russia, Belarus and Ukraine. The requirement will take effect in three months. The Interior Ministry said it believes the measure will reduce illegal immigration, crimes committed by foreigners and the illegal employment of foreigners. The Czech Republic was asked to harmonize its visa policies with those of the EU in the EU's 1999 evaluation. The three states are expected to reciprocate the measure. Foreign Minister Jan Kavan said the Government will consider visa requirements for Moldavia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Tadjikistan and Georgia. David Mirejovsky/Veronika Hankusova Bohumil Fiser Is New Health Minister President Vaclav Havel February 9 named Bohumil Fiser, head of the Physiological Institute at Masaryk University in Brno, as successor to former Health Minister Ivan David. Fiser's naming is only the beginning of expected changes in the Government. Ministers believed on their way out include Antonin Peltram (transport), Jaromir Cisar (regional development), Jaroslav Basta (deputy prime minister) and Vaclav Grulich (interior). Prime Minister Milos Zeman informed the president about the forthcoming changes February 8. Havel said the changes should take place after the Chamber of Deputies passes the state budget, which will be discussed at the beginning of March. Tereza Tesarikova/Veronika Hankusova Head of National Property Fund Resigns Jan Stiess resigned from his position as National Property Fund (FNM) chairman February 4, just before the fund's presidium was to discuss his recall. "Massive media attacks, which have complicated my personal life, and that makes the situation in managing the FNM difficult, led me to the decision to resign," said Stiess, who remains a fund employee as well as its representantive on the boards of many companies partly owned by the state. Stiess' departure has been discussed because of his falsified screening/lustration (background checks on the communist past of prospective state employees) documents last November. Police confirmed his lustration document, which showed no connection to the former state police StB, was a forgery January 11. Immediately the debate broke out whether lustration was relevant for the fund's chairmanship and whether Stiess actually cooperated with the StB. Stiess denies collaboration and says he is going to sue the Interior Ministry. He said he was publicly attacked because of his determination in the fund to pursue an energetic policy of restructuring Czech industry. In contrast to Stiess' claim, the weekly Tyden published a copy of a document from an Interior Ministry department showing Stiess was registered as a counterintelligence service collaborator on September 18, 1980, under the alias Strkal. The fund's presidium decided February 4 that all future fund chairmen have a clean past, despite the Finance Ministry's claim that the Lustration Act does not cover National Property Fund staff. The fund will be chaired temporarily by Stiess' deputy Jiri Havel. Martin Rusek/Milan Smid Army Bought Defective Chopper Props The Defense Ministry received from the Motokov company a supply of defective propellers for its Mi-24 combat helicopters, a ministry source confirmed February 8. That was the second time spare parts for the Mi-24 helicopters worth hundreds of millions of crowns included defective propellers. In 1998 Motokov brought from Russia old propellers that had been repainted and given new production numbers. This year's supply is in better shape than those propellers, said Defense Ministry Inspection Office head Jaroslav Svabik. "We found some defects, but this time it's not scrap like two years ago," he said. The Chamber of Deputies' Defense and Security Committee Chairman Petr Necas criticized the Defense Ministry for its trade policies and asked it to reconsider its contracts with Motokov. Martin Rusek/Milan Smid Plan for Romany Integration Rejected The plan for Romany integration, submitted to the Government by its Envoy for Human Rights Petr Uhl, was rejected and returned for changes. The most controversial proposal - establishing an office for ethnic equality and Romany integration - was rejected, because ministers said its budget (between 500 million crowns and 1 billion crowns annually) was too high and its establishment was unnecessary. The Government said it does not oppose projects to help Romanies get access to education and training, but they cannot accept the organizational and conceptual shortcomings of the plan. Other elements of the plan included various entitlement programs, free requalification and education, cheap housing and assistance for Romany companies. Tereza Tesarikova/Daniela Vrbova Questions Surround Sentence for Marijuana Sale Stanislav Pobuda, 19, from Frydek-Mistek sold 50 marijuana cigarettes to three friends, one of them under 15. For that he was sentenced to four years' imprisonment. Chief of the Inter-Ministry Anti-Drug Commission Josef Radimecky called the sentence the social disqualification of Pobuda. Radimecky wrote in an open letter, "I cannot idly watch how a young man who has searched with difficulty for his place in society, was instead of a rehabilitational - probationary punishment, sentened to four years." Radimecky also cited the recent case where the same court handed down a sentence of two and a half years to a man who had sold the amphetamine-based hard drug pervitin to youngsters for at least six months. Debate around the sentence has been very lively, with planned requests for amnesty from President Vaclav Havel and attention to the fact that Czech law does not differentiate between types of drugs, i.e., hard drugs and soft drugs. Martin Rusek/Daniela Vrbova NEWS IN BRIEF * The deaf and hard-of-hearing followed February 5 the example of the blind and visually impaired demonstrators (see Carolina 360) and protested against cuts in the state budget that limit resources for their projects. About 200 people gathered on Old Town Square with banners reading "We do not hear, but we are here," or "We want to live, not survive." The Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs said the cuts are inevitable because of a shortage of money in the budget and because of exaggerated demands by lobbies for handicapped people. Tereza Tesarikova/Milan Smid ECONOMY Erste Bank Buys Czech Savings Bank The Government February 2 decided on the new majority owner of the Czech Savings Bank (CS): 52 per cent of the bank will be sold for 19 billion crowns to Austria's Erste Bank Sparkassen The purchase contract should be signed within one month. The 52-per-cent share is owned by the state through the National Property Fund, which will receive the proceeds from the sale. However, the purchase means a loss for the state because it has invested some 30-40 billion crowns to clean the Czech Savings Bank in the past. Erste Bank will be protected from further financial risk by state guarantees on some classified loans. Erste will have the right to transfer these problem loans to the state-owned Consolidation Bank, meaning the state's total losses on the Czech Savings Bank could still grow. Erste Bank is, according to some sources, the second-largest banking group in Austria (thanks mainly to its merger with GiroCredit). It has expanded to the Hungarian market and has been trying to build an international banking house for central Europe focused on retail banking. On the Czech market Erste Bank will keep the Czech Savings Bank name. Erste promises to raise its new acquisition's capital by 4 billion crowns, to improve its computer network, to invest in educational projects and loans for housing, agriculture and venture capital. Erste will probably cut the number of employees (about 16,000 today) and branches (twice as many as Erste with half its deposits). Unemployment Rate Close to 10 Per Cent At the end of January unemployment offices registered 508,451 unemployed individuals, which means a rise in the unemployment rate to 9.8 per cent. Many expect the 10-per-cent barrier to be crossed soon, owing mainly to company restructuring and seasonal changes. The worst situation was in the regions Most (20.5%), Karvina, Louny and Chomutov (all over 18%). On the contrary, Prague and the regions Benesov and Mlada Boleslav were all around 4%. ECONOMY IN BRIEF * A District Court in Pilsen (Plzen) decided February 7 that an approximately 22-per-cent share of Skoda Pilsen will be auctioned off in a public sale. The share is owned by the company NERo, belonging to former Skoda General Director Lubomir Soudek. The company NERo, however, has been in bankruptcy since October. The opening price for the Skoda shares will be 245 million crowns. The amount paid for the shares will go to satisfy claims against NERo held by the Investment and Postal Bank (IPB). * The Czech National Bank (CNB) showed a profit of 32.4 billion crowns in 1999, especially thanks to the weakening of the crown and the sale of its shares in the Czechoslovak Trade Bank (CSOB). However, the profit will not be included in the state budget. The bank will use it to cover part of its 1997 losses of 50.7 billion crowns. The CNB has not in past years given its profits to the state - it has them to build up reserves for losses connected with the consolidation and stabilization of the banking sector. * Some 1,700 employees of Brno tractor-maker Zetor returned to work February 7 after six weeks of forced vacation. They did not return to build tractors, but to take inventory, clean and maintain machines. The company lacks financing to start production (it needs 300-400 million crowns) and has no prospective financing. It is expected that some employees will be fired, unnecessary material will be sold and the company might be placed in bankruptcy. Zetor has not paid its employees full wages since June and has paid no wages since November. Economy news prepared by Lubos Kratochvil and Petra Kovacova, translated by Denisa Vitkova Rates at the Czech National Bank (valid February 11) -------------------------------------------------------------- 1 EUR = 35.710 country currency CZK ------------------------------------------ Australia 1 AUD 22.830 Great Britain 1 GBP 58.147 Denmark 1 DKK 4.796 Japan 100 JPY 33.186 Canada 1 CAD 24.878 IMF 1 XDR 48.718 Hungary 100 HUF 13.965 Norway 1 NOK 4.419 New Zealand 1 NZD 17.771 Poland 1 PLN 8.679 Greece 100 GRD 10.730 Slovakia 100 SKK 84.401 Slovenia 100 SIT 17.762 Sweden 1 SEK 4.209 Switzerland 1 CHF 22.237 USA 1 USD 36.083 Exchange Rates of countries participating in the euro (converted from the euro rate) country currency CZK ----------------------------------------- Germany 1 DEM 18.258 Belgium 100 BEF 88.523 Finland 1 FIM 6.006 France 1 FRF 5.444 Ireland 1 IEP 45.342 Italy 1000 ITL 18.443 Luxemburg 100 LUF 88.523 Netherlands 1 NLG 16.204 Portugal 100 PTE 17.812 Austria 1 ATS 2.595 Spain 100 ESP 21.462 CULTURE Festival of Slovak Theater in Prague Again The Eugene Ionesco drama The Chair, performed by Little Stage of the Slovak National Theatre (Mala scena SND) with Slovak stars Emilia Vasaryova and Emil Horvath, opened the 5th Festival of Slovak Theater in Prague. The main stage of the festival, which takes place February 7-14, is Prague's Theater without Balustrades in the Adria Palace. Slovak theaters are represented by the SNP Theater from Martin (with the drama Lady from Cachtice), the Andrej Bagar Theater from Nitra (Albee's Three Women) and by the Radosin Naive Theater (The Bee) and Theater Astorka Korzo (An Axe Murder in St. Petersburg) from Bratislava. Milan Lasica and Julius Satinsky brought to Prague the same drama as last year: Slawomir Mrozek's Emigrees. Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream will be presented by students of the University of Dramatic Arts (VSMU) in Bratislava. The festival will be closed by the talk show A Slovak Language Course (Kurz slovenciny) by musician Jaro Filip, singer Richard Muller and Stano Radic in which politicians Petra Buzkova, Milan Knazko and Michal Prokop should participate. All performances were sold out by last week. Michal Pospisil/Milan Smid SPORTS Hockey Coach Ivan Hlinka Leaves National Team for Pittsburgh Still a few days ago, when he returned from a stay in Pittsburgh, national ice-hockey team coach Ivan Hlinka, 50, rejected all speculation about him leaving for the NHL. Now he has a signed contract and will be the head coach of the NHL's Pittsburgh Penguins for three and a half years. He will be the first European coach in the NHL. Hlinka will join the Czech legion in Pittsburgh, led by team captain Jaromir Jagr. He will move to America in a few days, and not after the World Championships, as had been planned. "I had no choice," he said sadly before the national team's departure for the Swedish Hockey Games, where he had to act as an observer. However, he did not have the patience to watch and left Stockholm during the first day of the tournament. "I can't just stand on the bench," he said. Hlinka played in the NHL, advancing to the Stanley Cup finals in 1982 with the Edmonton Oilers. He was a member of three World Champion Czech teams - in 1972, 1976 and 1977. His coaching career was crowned by the 1998 Nagano Olympic gold medal and the 1999 Lillehammer World Championships title. On the national team Hlinka will be replaced by Josef Augusta. Czech Tennis Players Return to Form, Going to America The match between the top players of the Czech Republic and Great Britain was decisive for the Davis Cup meeting of the countries in Ostrava-Poruba February 4-6. Jiri Novak dragged a tired Tim Henman down. He won the Czechs' third point and the Czech team advanced, after years of shame of struggle in the qualification rounds, to the quarterfinals. The Czechs will meet the United States April 7-9, probably in Los Angeles. In the opening singles match, Slava Dosedel led 2-1 and served for the match, but Tim Henman turned the match around and after four and a half hours he won the first point. Czech team captain Jan Kukal found one positive fact: "Slava forced Henman to give everything he had, which showed up in his next matches." Jiri Novak got the point back with a win over Jamie Delgado. In doubles, Novak and David Rikl defeated Atlanta Olympics silver-medal winners Neil Broad and Henman. After Novak won the third point, Bohdan Ulihrach successfully returned after his injury. Results: Dosedel - Henman 7-6 (7-4), 7-5, 1-6, 5-7, 3-6. Novak - Delgado 6-4, 7-6 (7-4), 6-3. Novak, Rikl - Henman, Broad 7-6 (7-4), 6-4, 6-7 (4-7), 6-2. Novak - Henman 6-4, 6-2, 6-2. Ulihrach - Delgado 5-7, 7-5, 6-4. National Soccer Team Wins Tournament in Hong Kong The Czech national soccer team won the Carlsberg Cup, which took place in Hong Kong February 5-8, the second Asian tournament win after the Kirin Cup in Japan two years ago. In the semifinal the Czechs defeated a team from the Hong Kong league after penalty kicks 4-3. Half-time substitute and top Czech-league scorer Marek Kincl decided the game. He set up the first goal for Marek Jankulovski in 48th minute and then, one minute before the end, saved the 2-2 draw. Rada, Lokvenc, Kincl and Necas converted the Czech penalties, Jankulovski failed. In the final against Mexico, after a goalless first half, in which goalkeeper Radek Cerny saved some good Mexican chances, Teplice's players shined. Martin Kolomaznik converted his teammate Pavel Verbir's pass for his first national team goal in the 50th minute, five minutes later Verbir added a second goal. Mexico, defending FIFA Cup champ, got one goal back but wound up on the short end of the final Czech 2-1 win. Sparta Praha Second-Best European Hockey Team As the prestige of the European Hockey League grows, the results of the Czech teams improve. Sparta finished fourth in 1997, Vsetin third in 1998. Sparta moved one step higher this year. The Final Four tournament was played in Lugano, Switzerland February 5-6. In the semifinal Sparta defeated the home team 3-2 on an overtime goal by Vladimir Vujtek, his second of the game. Sparta led 2-1, but goalkeeper Petr Briza had to save it from elimination. In the final Sparta met reigning champion Metallurg Magnitogorsk of Russia. Sparta allowed two goals by Razin and could not manage to score. Hockey Extraleague: Havirov's Coach Sacked Havirov coach Richard Farda was fired because of his club's poor play. Eighth-place Znojmo, which would be in the playoffs today, helped itself with a win in Zlin, but Pardubice is playing well again. Results of the 42nd round: Vsetin - Zlin 2-3, Karlovy Vary - Slavia Praha 5-3, Znojmo - Vitkovice 2-6, Plzen - Kladno 5-2, Litvinov - Ceske Budejovice 4-1, Havirov - Trinec 3-9. The game between Sparta Praha and Pardubice is postponed to February 16. Results of the 43rd round: Trinec - Vsetin 6-2, Zlin - Znojmo 3-4, Vitkovice - Karlovy Vary 4-6, Pardubice - Havirov 5-2, Litvinov - Plzen 0-0, Slavia Praha - Kladno 2-6. The game between Ceske Budejovice and Sparta Praha is postponed to March 7. Standings: 1. Sparta Praha, 58 points (3 games to play), 2. Vsetin 54, 3. Plzen 53 (1), 4. Zlin 51 (1), 5. Trinec 49, 6. Ceske Budejovice 48, 7. Litvinov 47, 8. Znojmo 39, 9. Pardubice 35 (2), 10. Karlovy Vary 35, 11. Slavia 34, 12. Havirov 32, 13. Vitkovice 30, 14. Kladno 29. SPORTS IN BRIEF * The Swedish Hockey Games, the last tournament of the Euro Hockey Tour, began in Stockholm. Two of the Czech team's games were played before Carolina's deadline: Czech Republic - Russia 6-2, Czech Republic - Finland 1-3. Sports news prepared by Martin Moravec, translated by Mirek Langer WEATHER Despite a forecast of colder winds for Central Europe, last week saw mild and nearly spring-like weather. Daily temperatures climbed to 5 degrees to 10 degrees Celsius/41 degrees to 50 degrees Fahrenheit in Prague, snow in the mountains slowly disappeared and, because tempermental cloudy weather produced heavy local rains, it was no wonder that the water of the Labe River overflowed local roads in Northern Bohemia. Farmers are afraid nature will awake and make them the victims of late frosts. English version edited by Michael Bluhm. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- This news may be published only with attribution to CAROLINA. Subscription is free. Comments and remarks are appreciated. 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