Euromedia Welcomes Czech President

He is one of the most prominent names on Knižní klub’s author roster - and certainly one of the Czech club and publishing company’s most productive: the Czech president Václav Klaus. President Klaus has already published ten books with the DirectGroup subsidiary, which always cause a stir both at home and abroad mainly because of his highly critical attitude towards the European Union. Last Tuesday, he presented his 11th Knižní klub book in Prague: "Rok sedmý" ( "Year Seven") . Traditionally, Klaus combines his book presentations with an autograph session at the "Luxor Book Palace" on Wenceslas Square in the centre of Prague, which once again led to long lines of fans at the bookstore.

The title of the book already hints at what it is about: It refers to 2009, Klaus's seventh year as Czech president. In ten chapters, he describes the main events of the past year and his view of things, above all of the Lisbon Treaty, which among other things strengthens the rights of the European Parliament, and which he battled against signing for so long. The book also covers the 20th anniversary of the fall of the communist regime, which was incidentally the topic of his Knižní klub book "Kde zacíná zítrek" (roughly: "Where Tomorrow Begins") published just last November, as well as the Czech EU Presidency in 2009, and meetings with US President Barack Obama and Pope Benedict XVI.

However Václav Klaus would not have been himself if he hadn’t used the public arena of the book presentation to settle with the pro-European forces in his country. The theme of Europe is also the focus of a speech that Klaus will be giving at Humboldt University in Berlin on Apr 29 and which will be, he says, his most important speech of the year. In the field of domestic politics, he believes the Czech Republic is in a governmental and constitutional crisis after the fall of Mirek Topolánek´s government and the cancellation of Parliament elections by the Constitutional Court. "Our country desperately needs a normal, functioning and working government," said Klaus.