MfD: Czech institute to be established for outgoing Klaus

Prague, Sept 7 (CTK) - The Vaclav Klaus Institute (IVK) is being established for the time after Czech President Vaclav Klaus's term of office expires in March 2013, daily Mlada fronta Dnes (MfD) writes Friday.

The preparations for Klaus's new office in a mansion in Prague's Hanspaulka elegant neighbourhood are in full swing, MfD writes.

"I have been fully busy with negotiating on the lease contract and all related affairs, including finances, in the past weeks," Jiri Weigl, head of Klaus's Presidential Office, is quoted as saying.

The mansion was repaired by its owner, businessman Jaroslav Cadek, who paid all the costs, MfD writes.

He has leased it to the IVK "for the price usual in the locality," it adds.

The richest Czech, Petr Kellner, will contribute to the IVK's operation, MfD writes.

"We have agreed with him that he will provide money for the lease of the IVK each year and he may partly contribute to its operational costs," Weigl said.

Kellner himself told the paper in April that he would donate tens of million crowns to the IVK.

Other sponsors may be involved, too, MfD writes.

The IVK is to be an institution analogous to the U.S. post-presidential libraries, Weigl said.

Along with the IVK, the mansion will house Klaus's "post-presidential office" and the Centre for Economics and Politics, a part of the IVK, he added.

The IVK is to serve the general public. It wants to stage public discussions on prominent issues of politics, economics and other spheres of public life, Weigl said.

It will deal with research and studies, collect literature on political and economic issues relating to Klaus's public activity and to present it to the public, he added.

The IVK will also collect, process and publish documents on Klaus's political activities in the past two decades and it will serve historians examining Czech contemporary history, Weigl said.

The IVK's area will be accessible to the public, he added.

Klaus, 71, has been Czech president since 2003. He was Czech prime minister in 1992-1998.