Last week 35/2007

News agencies reported that archeologists found a 2-million-year-old human footprint in Egypt. The Chamber of Deputies approved the tax and social reforms prepared by Mirek Topolánek’s cabinet. Thirty-nine years passed since the coup de main against the Czechoslovak Army by its communist allies on August 21, 1968. The body of a drowned Pardubice man reported missing by his wife a week earlier was found in the Švihov reservoir near Humpolec. Jugglers and illusionists flaunted their arts in Náměšt’ nad Oslavou. The discovery of dry rot closed a school in Rokycany.

“What they did for me is incredible. My dream came true,” said Countess Sofie Hartigová, born Valdštejnová, (86) after ten volunteers carried her up to Bezděz Castle in a makeshift litter, thereby giving her a chance to gaze onto what was once her family’s earldom, which stretched from Bezděz all the way to Mnichovo Hradiště. Former Czech president Václav Havel signed a petition in favor of locating the American radar base in the Czech Republic. The Russian Federation decided to enter the race to occupy the vacant post of managing director of the International Monetary Fund and put up its own horse – Czech banker Josef Tošovský, who was recently reported to have collaborated with the former communist secret police (StB) – against European Union candidate Dominique Strauss-Kahn. Josef Tošovský proclaimed he was “honored” by the Kremlin’s proposal, but the Czech government issued a communiqué saying it was firmly behind the EU nominee and would not vote for Moscow’s proposal.

Following a public competition to replace dismissed Traffic Police Chief Zdeněk Bambas, the only applicant, Martin Červíček, was appointed to the post. “I’m sorry, but I really can’t recall it now. Why, I don’t even know what I judged three days ago,” current vice chair of the Regional Court in Brno Marie Káňová told Hospodářské noviny, commenting on her 30-year-old ruling that sent Evangelical minister and Charter 77 signatory Jan Šimsa to prison for eight months for shoving an StB officer who was aggressively harassing his wife during a home search; the Supreme Court recently refused to rehabilitate Šimsa for his “crime,” and the minister, at the insistence of his friends and “not because of a sense of injustice but out of principle,” took his appeal to the Constitutional Court. Mycologists announced that, due to drought, this season is among the worst mushrooming seasons in modern history.

TV Nova founder and current European MP Vladimír Železný was given a suspended sentence and a five-million-crown fine by a Prague Court for tax fraud in connection with the import of valuable paintings; two more fraud trials await Železný. Johann Le Guillerm and his Cirque ici opened this year’s Letní Letná new circus festival. On recommendation of Defense Minister Vlasta Parkanová and Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg, the government decided to redeploy Czech troops from Faizabad in northern Afghanistan to the wild border province of Loghar, where the Czechs should undertake managing the provincial reconstruction team. The annual sculpting symposium in Vysoká closed with a tour and the jury’s praise. Former premier and Social Democratic chairman Miloš Zeman announced that he had decided to remain silent once and for all and would not make any comments for newspapers even if they asked.

A record 245,000 people came to watch the motorcycle Grand Prix at Brno’s Masaryk Circuit. “Should the American radar be located in your country, we will be forced to take security measures against your country, with which we are otherwise bound by longtime, good, partner, comradely, and friendly relations,” said Yuri Baluyevsky, the Russian military chief of staff, to a Czech diplomatic delegation. Climatologists informed the public that the last 12 months had been the hottest ever in the Czech Republic since statistics had been kept, that is, in the last 232 years.

The lengthy repair and reconstruction of Charles Bridge, which has been in the works for thirteen years, began. Torrential rains from a storm that swept through Mikulov uncovered a hole in the pavement leading to previously unknown underground caverns with splendid formations. A former police officer who crashed his car into Ostrava’s Petr Bezruč Theatre while heavily intoxicated was given a suspended sentence by an Ostrava court. The Slavonice organization organized its fifth annual POLICE festival, POLICE07, in Police.