Prague, April 25 (CTK) – The entrance to the southern palace gardens, above which there is the part of the Prague Castle that houses the Presidential Office, has been closed for security reasons, President Milos Zeman’s spokesman Jiri Ovcacek told CTK Saturday.
Only a small part of the gardens will be closed to the public, Ovcacek said. The windows of Zeman’s office are facing this garden, he added.
The entrance leading from the Hradcany Square, outside the Castle, to the Garden of Eden has not been reopened this tourist season, he said.
People can get to the other gardens but they must use the entrances in the third courtyard or from the Old Castle Stairs.
Ovcacek dismissed the view that the closing of the entrance was the first of steps that should ban the public from entering a large part of the Castle.
The Prague Castle adopted stricter security measures in the past few months in connection with the terrorist attacks in Paris and Brussels and the increased terrorist threat in general.
The measures also reacted to an action of a Czech activist group that replaced the presidential flag on the palace’s roof with red trunks in protest against Zeman’s politics late last year. Due to the incident, the Prague Castle Guard chief, the security section head and the chief of the presidential bodyguards were dismissed.
The Presidential Office also wants to install security frames, it increased the number of cameras and of the police officers and soldiers patrolling its premises.
