Prague, Feb 2 (CTK) – British and Czech Prime Ministers David Cameron and Bohuslav Sobotka have made a bargain, within which the former promised to stop blocking the sale of Czech aircraft to Iraq and the latter not to oppose the British plan to reduce welfare, weekly Respekt has written in its latest issue.
Cameron arrived in Prague on January 22 to receive the Czech consent to the reform proposals, with which he has been trying to strengthen the British position in the European Union, Ondrej Kundra writes in Respekt.
Kundra says Cameron wants to have his EU reform proposals approved by the other EU member states in order to persuade his voters that Britain should stay in the EU.
Britain will call a referendum on its EU membership by the end of 2017.
First of all, Cameron plans to reduce welfare support for EU citizens working in Britain, which is opposed by other European countries including the Czech Republic, Kundra writes.
However, the priority of Prague is that Britain remain in the EU and so Sobotka wanted to reach some agreement from the beginning, same as Cameron, Kundra writes.
He says Sobotka nevertheless needed to ask Cameron for something that he could present to his voters as a success, in exchange for his later nodding to the British demands, because nothing is given for free in politics.
Sobotka therefore asked London for help with the sale of the Czech-made L-159 aircraft to Iraq, Kundra writes.
This sale was agreed on about nine months ago, but Britain has been blocking it, arguing that some sensitive British components in the Czech aircraft might get into the hands of terrorists.
This is of course only part of the truth: London wanted to thwart the sale because it is offended that the Iraqi government preferred the L-159s to the British Hawks, Kundra writes.
In protest against the British veto of the aircraft sale, Sobotka planned to be absent from a donor conference on Syria that will be held in London on Thursday.
Cameron wishes to have at the conference as many European leaders as possible. The European guests will be a proof that he deals with the refugee problem in the Middle East using finances from other EU countries, which helps build a barrier against a further migrant wave and which of course helps protect Britain, Kundra writes.
As part of the bargain, Sobotka will announce in London that the Czech Republic would give six million euros in aid of Syria, which is a relatively high sum per capita, given the Czech population of ten million, Kundra says.
Cameron promised that he would do his best to remove the problem that is blocking the sale of the Czech planes to Iraq, which means that the British Defence Ministry would officially approve the contract. Prague did not reject the British reform proposals and it indicated that it would not mind the arising European compromise on the reform, Kundra writes.
Both Britain and the Czech Republic indicated what they would do, but they did not make their final say, he writes.
Then Cameron and Sobotka smiled together into the cameras in Prague and praised one another for their good cooperation, Kundra writes.
