Czech news in brief for October 21: Saturday’s headlines

Czech arms manufacturer STV Group has been authorized by the Czech government to supply Israel with 3,000 ballistic plates (also known as armor plates) for bulletproof vests, Czech Defense Minister Jana Černochová has confirmed. The plates, classified “level 3” (the second highest level of protection), should be delivered in the coming days.

Černochová also raised the possibility of additional support from the Czech Republic to Israel, including helping to build a military field hospital. STV Group is known for producing munitions, repairing heavy military equipment and recently delivering repaired RM-70 multiple rocket launchers to Ukraine with the help of a public fundraising campaign.

The Ostrava Zoological Garden welcomed a pair of highly endangered little owls, known as the smallest owls in the Czech Republic and Europe. These tiny owls were received from a private breeder. The aviary complex at Ostrava Zoo is already home to several species of owls native to the Czech Republic.

These avian additions raise awareness of the plight of these birds, which are threatened due to the lack of suitable nesting sites and the impact of intensive agriculture and pesticide use on their food sources. The zoo is actively involved in European owl conservation projects, providing young owls for release into the wild.

The Czech Ministry of Transport has announced a new service for motorists that will provide internet notifications of penalty points for traffic violations. It will give drivers the option to receive these alerts via SMS, email or special app notification.

Currently, drivers are often unaware of their points status, making it difficult to track how close they are to the 12-point threshold for license suspension. This upcoming change aims to simplify the points system and increase the total financial return on fines. Interested drivers can sign up to receive these notifications via the website Transport portalwhich requires a digital identity to access it.

Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala expressed satisfaction with the current random checks at the Slovak border, seeing them as an effective measure to deter illegal immigration and smuggling through the Czech Republic. He noted that other central European countries have implemented similar controls in response to the passage of migrants, mainly from Syria.

Fiala stressed the need for a comprehensive EU-wide solution to prevent illegal entry at the EU’s external borders, as existing controls address the consequences rather than the root causes . Migrants used Czechia as a transit route to Germany, which has also instituted border controls, and readmission agreements allow detained migrants to be returned to their countries of origin.

The government announced on Friday that a new amendment to the Labor Code – effective January 1, 2024 – should again allow 24-hour hospital shifts and return the limit on voluntary overtime to pre-October levels. Doctors across the country are currently unhappy with the recent amendment to the Labor Code, which doubled the number of permitted voluntary overtime hours to 416 and ended the practice of linking overtime to a shift.

Labor Minister Marian Jurečka clarified that under the proposed amendment, the maximum shift duration would be limited to 12 hours and any additional hours beyond that could be supplemented with overtime. He stressed that this arrangement is entirely optional rather than mandatory.

Czech Education Minister Mikuláš Bek on Friday stressed the importance of integrating Roma-related topics into revised primary and secondary school curricula. During discussions at the Museum of Roma Culture in Brno, he stressed the need to address Roma issues in teacher training and to teach Czech students more about Roma history.

Bek also visited a local primary school with a predominantly socially disadvantaged student population, where he explored the possibility of providing teaching assistants. It placed emphasis on tailoring support to specific circumstances in schools with higher numbers of socially disadvantaged pupils. According to a recent study by the PAQ research agency, there are nearly 80 schools in the Czech Republic where the majority of students are Roma children.

Czech Foreign Minister Jan Lipavský met his Croatian counterpart Gordan Grlic Radman in Zagreb on Friday to discuss the Western Balkan countries’ efforts to join the EU. Lipavský thanked Croatian authorities for helping Czech tourists on the Adriatic coast and enabling Czech police operations in Croatia. Both ministers highlighted the strong historical and friendly relations between the two nations, with the Czech and Croatian minorities contributing to these ties.

Lipavský also highlighted the importance of the Western Balkans for European security. The two ministers also spoke about preparations for the Crimean Platform summit in Prague later this month, where Croatia’s participation inspired the Speaker of the Czech Chamber of Deputies, Markéta Pekarová Adamová, to head the committee of organization of the summit.