Last week 13/08

Spring began, and snow covered Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia. Storks returned. The government of Communist China used tanks and gunfire to scatter the demonstrations for freedom that have popped up all over occupied Tibet; 140 demonstrators have died so far in the Chinese Army's crackdowns, the media reported. „The government condemns and calls for an immediate end to the violence against demonstrators who come to freely express their opinion. We also call for the release of individuals who have been preventatively detained,“ Topolánek's Cabinet sent word to Beijing. „Tibet has been part of modern-day China for many generations so I think it is up to China to decide how to resolve these matters,“ remarked Jiří Paroubek, chairman of the opposition Czech Social Democratic Party. A thousand opponents of the US military base in Brdy marched through Prague chanting the slogan „Radar = New Occupation“. České dráhy (Czech Railways) increased the number of ticket counters in train stations where customers can buy airline tickets as well as train tickets. „We're ready for Schengen,“ announced a banner at the entrance to the Prague-Ruzyňe Airport, where passengers from Schengen Agreement countries should not be required to undergo passport controls as of April 1st. The government proposed a bill that would require all applicants for Czech citizenship to have perfect knowledge of the Czech language. A bill making 65 the official retirement age for Czech men was passed by the Chamber of Deputies in the first reading. Some 116 cars crashed on the D1 highway due to unexpected snowfall. The title of „Most Abused Animal in the Czech Republic“ was bestowed on hens raised in popular cage-breeding operations - creatures that never walk on their feet, never lie down on bedding and never spread their wings during their year-long lives; statisticians calculated that 97 percent of the millions of hens bred in the Czech Republic are raised in such conditions.

„I am horrified. The names of special forces members should remain confidential even after their death; publicizing them can put their colleagues or families at risk - confidentiality is the international standard,“ security expert Pavel Šalmach told reporters after President Václav Klaus, while convalescing, revealed the name of a Czech soldier who, together with two of his Danish colleagues and four Afghan civilians, was killed by a suicide bomber in the southern Afghan province of Hilmand; the soldier's family requested police protection following Klaus's indiscretion. Elected municipal councils outranked the Czech president on the list of the most trustworthy public-sector officials and authorities. Ski-lift operators warned skiers that the end of the winter sport season was approaching. The collapse of a US bank, Bear Stearns, caused share prices on global markets, including the Prague Stock Exchange, to plummet, and economists announced there was no more hope of a quick recovery from the ongoing economic crisis. A decision by legislators definitively took train tracks out of České dráhy's possession. The Health Ministry warned customers against buying a Chinese product, Medvídkův talířek (Bear's Plate), because anyone eating from these plastic plates, which carry a picture of Winnie the Pooh on the packaging, will swallow a dose of poisonous formaldehyde with every meal. „The legislative expertise seems clear: there is no chance of anyone wanting a ticket from us,“ said parliamentary deputy and chair of the Chamber of Deputies' immunity committee Miloslav Kala (Social Democratic Party), reacting to a decision by the Prague public transit company (DPP), whose management asked its ticket controllers to focus primarily on discovering and fining politicians who ride on public transportation illegally. Interior Minister Ivan Langer informed the government that „oil and natural gas deliveries and prices are becoming a tool of Russian foreign policy.“ The Czech intelligence service decided to expand the number of jobs for spies specializing in Russia by 46. Ornithologist Tomáš Grim, from Olomouc's Univerzita Palackého (Palacký University), discovered that scientific performance diminishes with increased beer consumption. „This discovery stemmed from a finding that all Czech ornithologists combined have published a total of 40 articles in prominent magazines over the last 25 years, i.e., the same number that French scientist Anders Moller manages in two years; when I asked him about the cause of that imbalance, he told me it's definitely the amount of beer we drink,“ said Grim, whose discovery earned him a nomination for the international Ig Nobel Prize for research that „first makes people laugh, then makes you think.“