News

Prague Zoo has selected eight Przewalski's horses, four of which will be transported to Kazakhstan in June in an effort to restore a population of the species in the wild, the zoo announced on Tuesday. The horses are now kept at a breeding station outside Prague.

Over the next five years, some 40 Przewalski horses from Czechia will be transported to the Altyn Dala steppe. The operation will be carried out under the auspices of Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala.

The Przewalski horse is a rare subspecies native to Mongolia, which became extinct in the wild in the 1960s. Prague Zoo has spearheaded international efforts to save the horse, breeding it and returning it to its natural environment.

A shipment of 20,000 vaccines against whooping cough from Canada will reach doctors within days, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has said, adding that distributors expect to receive them on Tuesday.

Because of a high incidence of whooping cough, doctors have seen a growing interest in vaccinations in recent weeks, with more than 45,000 people getting inoculated against the disease, compared to 24,000 last year.

There were 1,494 new cases of whooping cough registered in Czechia last week, the biggest weekly increase since the start of this year. The total number of cases so far this year is 7,888, the most in one year since 1959, when the vaccine was introduced.

Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala is scheduled to meet with Mike Johnson, the head of the House of Representatives, as well as other members of Congress on Tuesday, the second day of his official visit to the US. He intends to discuss the release of $60 billion in US aid to Ukraine, which has been blocked for several months in Congress by House Republicans, who have a majority in the chamber. He said he wants to convey the Central European experience and point of view to the Republicans at Tuesday's meetings in an effort to convince them of the importance of approving the package.

The prime minister will also be giving a speech at the Hudson Institute about transatlantic relations, the war in Ukraine, and the Czech-American alliance. Before returning to Europe, he will host a gala dinner attended by Czech investors and representatives of US companies.

During his meeting with Prime Minister Petr Fiala at the White House on Monday, US President Joe Biden praised Czechia's support for Ukraine, especially its efforts to secure ammunition from outside the EU for the invaded country, and stated that he considers it a great ally.

For his part, the Czech prime minister described the fact that Czechia and the United States share the same core values of human rights, freedom and democracy as "crucial" for coping with today's challenges such as terrorism, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, or the complex situation in the Middle East, adding that security cooperation between democratic countries is a necessity.

Mr. Fiala also praised Biden's role in supporting Ukraine and described the mutual relations between their two countries as "excellent", citing the signing of the Defense Cooperation Agreement last year and Czechia's purchase of US fifth-generation F-35 fighter jets as examples. He also recalled the role of the United States in the creation of the independent state of Czechoslovakia in 1918 and mentioned former US Secretary of State and Prague native Madeleine Albright as examples of the strong links between their two countries.