Prague, July 18 (CTK) – Officials from the Czech Interior Ministry, Police Presidium and the Supreme State Attorney’s Office will discuss Supreme State Attorney Pavel Zeman’s comments on a planned police reform at a meeting on Tuesday, which, however, Zeman will not attend, he told CTK yesterday.
Zeman said he will only attend the cabinet meeting on Wednesday that is to deal with the police shake-up that caused a rift in among the government coalition partners.
Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka’s Social Democrats (CSSD) back the shake-up proposed by the police command and signed by Interior Minister Milan Chovanec (CSSD) as a step to make the police’s fight against corruption and organised crime more effective.
The ANO movement of Deputy PM Andrej Babis opposes the reform as overhasty, suspicious and counter-productive.
The plan has also been challenged by some state attorneys including Pavel Zeman.
Zeman previously sent his comments on the reform to the Police Presidium.
He told CTK yesterday that the Tuesday meeting is supposed to deal with his comments. The State Attorney’s Office will be represented in it by his deputies and lower-level state attorneys, he said.
The Interior Ministry told CTK it would not comment on the meeting due on Tuesday and will provide information only after the cabinet meeting on Wednesday.
Earlier this month, a parliamentary commission has been established to enquire into the police reform that is to take effect on August 1.
ANO and the third coalition partner, the Christian Democrats (KDU-CSL), wanted the issue to be discussed at a meeting of the National Security Council (BRS) on Wednesday, but PM Sobotka has not included it in the BRS meeting’s agenda.
