Press Advisories

18. 3. 2009 9:51

Announcement of the Prime Minister after an Extraordinary Meeting of the Government

After an extraordinary meeting of the government on the evening of 18 March, Mirek Topolánek appeared on a live Czech Television broadcast with this announcement.

I would like to say that there was a fairly unprecedented meeting today of the Chamber of Deputies. Against all customs, which do not, of course, have to be respected, our three ministers who are fulfilling their duties in the framework of the European Union were not paired. I would say that this may still be comprehensible, but what is humanly incomprehensible is that two seriously ill colleagues who could not attend the meeting were not paired.

For this reason, the government decided today in its evening meeting to take back, which is the instrument of withdrawal, both agreements with the United States of America on the placement of American units on Czech territory. This does not mean that we have resigned from the ratification process, because we can return this material back to the Chamber of Deputies at any time. We wanted to prevent a similar situation as happened with our soldiers in Afghanistan, where even their lives were in danger due to the non-ratification of their mission. This means that the agreement of the Senate is valid, and that we will return to these talks after meeting with the American administration and the meeting at the NATO summit in Strasbourg and Kehl. I believe this is such a serious announcement that I felt the need to notify you in this way.

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Premiér k mimořádnému jednání vlády

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