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Czech Republic

The Czech Republic is located in the heart of Europe, bordering Germany, Poland, Slovakia and Austria.

The country is about 80,000 square kilometers and has about 10 million inhabitants.
It consists essentially of two historical regions: Bohemia (with the capital Prague) and Moravia (with Brno, the second largest city in the country)

The Czechs are at 90%, the vast majority of the population. In addition, there are Slovak, Polish, German, Roma, Hungarians and Ruthenians.

From the sixth century, Slavic peoples began to settle in Bohemia and Moravia. They were the ancestors of the Czechs and formed a small principality, which went to the end of the ninth century under the rule of the later Holy Roman Empire of the German nation.

Thus Bohemia fell under the German sphere of influence, which is a significant German settlement meant. In the capital Prague, the first university in Central Europe was founded. It was founded in 1348 by the Bohemian King Charles I (later Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV)

A second important event was the emergence of a reform movement that began in the 15th Century of Jan Hus appealed.The Hussite movement was important, as they resisted the imperial rule over Bohemia.

In Prague, it was in 1618 for triggering the thirty-year war in which Protestants and Catholics faced. This was the famous Defenestration of Prague. Czech nobles who opposed the authoritarian rule of the Habsburg threw three imperial governor from the window of Prague Castle, and told the Protestants of the Palatinate, Frederick King of Bohemia. But the Czechs were defeated by the Austrians and lost all autonomy.

They remained under the domination of the Austrian Habsburgs, and indeed until 1918.

A third important event was the first world war. The Czechs, who had fought on the side of the Allies declared on 28 October 1918 and formed their independence of Slovakia and Ruthenia a state of Czechoslovakia.

This was not very stable. Between the agrarian Slovakia and the industrialized Czech Republic together is not easy. The frontier established in the treaties of Versailles and St. Germain was long and hard to defend. Also lived in the outskirts of significant minorities.Hungarians in southern Slovakia and in the German Sudetenland. The Sudetenland was annexed in October 1938 by the Nazi state.

According to the Munich Agreement the Sudetenland was annexed by Germany and the territories of the Hungarian minority joined Hungary.

Slovakia became independent and Bohemia and Moravia a German Protectorate.

The development after the second world war is better known.

After the liberation of the country by the Red Army of the Sudeten Germans were expelled, and Czechoslovakia, in May 1948, a People's Republic. The only bright spot was in 1968, the Prague Spring (abolition of censorship, the release of imprisoned writers, rehabilitation of victims of Stalinism, concessions to the church permission to leave). But the Prague Spring was once the winter, when Prague was occupied in August 1968 by tanks and Czechoslovakia remained firmly anchored in the Soviet bloc until 1989. Then, when the Berlin Wall fell, we first tried as soon as possible after the European integration to find by joining the EU and NATO. Czechs and Slovaks separated on 1 January 1993 peacefully.

The Czech Republic joined NATO in 1999 and 2004 by the EU.

Now to the economy of the country:

The Czech brand Skoda, a subsidiary of the Volkswagen Group, is based in Mlada Boleslav in the north-east of Prague. Since 2004 in Kolin, the Franco-Japanese consortium Toyota-Peugeot-Citroen at home. And the South Korean carmaker Hyundai has established in 2007 in Nosovice in northern Moravia.

There is also a strong services sector, which employs over half the labor force - especially in trade and tourism. Prague is an ancient city with architectural treasures of different styles from different eras that attract tourists from all over the world.

And then there's agriculture. You It represents only 3% of GDP, but it gives world-famous beers. The Pilsner is not coming from Germany but from the Czech Republic and the Budweiser Budvar brewed in the Czech Republic.

Now to the Czech Republic relation to European integration. The Czech Republic joined the EU in May 2004, for which 77% of Czechs had spoken aloud. The EU is the small country of only 10 million inhabitants, a third vital partner, which compensates for the relationship to the great neighbors Germany and Russia. Maybe depends on the Eurosceptic stance, together with the country's past, because after the German and Soviet domination giving a special emphasis on a close relationship with the United States.The country had joined in 1999 by NATO. Czech Republic 2003 supported the American intervention in Iraq. Finally, the Czech Republic has granted the United States to build a radar installation in the Czech Republic. It is part of the American missile defense system and is intended to protect U.S. from threats from Iran.

However, neighboring Russia does not in the least believe that the U.S. wants to defend itself against Iran. Moscow is convinced that the radar system is directed against Russia. This leads to tensions between Washington and Moscow, and thus between Moscow and Prague.