Czechia’s score in Transparency International’s annual Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) has hardly improved at all over the last eight years. While its position in the 2023 ranking remains the same as the year before, it still scored well below the EU average. I spoke to Marek Chromý, head analyst at Transparency International’s Czech branch, to find out why.

The Czech health sector is currently short of around 3,000 registered nurses. What makes things worse is that a third of the country’s nurses are now over the age of 60 and are due to retire within the next ten years. Hospital heads are ringing alarm bells and calling for action from the government.

Czech scientists recently discovered what is believed to be the country’s oldest beech tree. Growing in a forest in Krušné Hory near the town of Horní Jiřetín, the tree witnessed the ascent of the Habsburg dynasty to the Czech throne, and is estimated to be at least 470 years old.

The names of three Czechoslovak ice hockey players will be used to mark the streets in a new housing development in Prague by real estate company Penta. The players, who were Olympic medal winners in the 1940’s in Czechoslovakia, were jailed without trial by the communist party in 1950.

Czechia has just signed an agreement with the United States to buy two dozen F-35 advanced fighter jets. The procurement is seen as significantly boosting the Czechs’ military capabilities and integration with NATO and represents the largest defence contract ever signed by the country.

In recent years Ed Ley has won fans on social media for his in-depth research into the streets of the Czech capital. Indeed the Englishman has already explored the stories of all the streets of Pragues 2 and 3 in daily postings on Twitter/X – and is now halfway through the city centre Prague 1. How did he get started? And what are some of the most remarkable facts he has turned up? I discussed these questions and much more with Ed Ley at our studios.

Following days of filibustering, the lower house on Thursday approved a government proposal to allow postal voting for Czechs living abroad. The governing coalition wants the bill, which faces two more readings in the lower house, approved in time for the 2025 parliamentary elections. I spoke to political scientist Petr Just about its significance and its chances of winning approval.

The name of Karel Havlíček Borovský, a 19th century pioneering journalist, writer and politician, is known to virtually every Czech. Widely considered as the founder of Czech journalism and literary criticism, Havlíček played a crucial role in the Czech National Revival. Despite his fame, however, not many Czechs are aware that he had a daughter called Zdeňka, once referred to as “the Daughter of the Nation”. A new TV series, which is now being shot in Czechia, aims to put the spotlight on her story.

A memorial plaque was unveiled in the French city of Marseille on Friday dedicated to former Czechoslovak diplomat Vladimír Vochoč, who helped to save hundreds of Jews from France during the Holocaust. Despite his service to the country, he was persecuted by the Communists and spent more than seven years in prison.

The Czech Senate rejected ratification of the Istanbul Convention in a hotly contested vote Wednesday night. The treaty, which Czechia formally signed in 2016, seeks to prevent, prosecute and eliminate domestic violence. So why have Czech politicians rejected it? I spoke to political scientist Jiří Pehe.