Czech morning news in brief: top stories for Nov. 16, 2020

COMMUNITY – People lit red lanterns or candles in their windows throughout Brno yesterday evening to express their thanks to medical workers fighting the current coronavirus pandemic. Lucie Stara, head of the local organization that had the idea for 'Lights of Hope', said hundreds of people took part in the event in the Bohunice district of Brno. Many people from other parts of the country joined it, too, she said. She said she hopes the symbolic support 'Light of Hope' has shown within the community will make its way to workers and patients in hospital and to those who are ill with Covid-19 at home, or in home quarantine.

TRAVEL – Germany, Sweden, Cyprus, as well as Lithuania and Latvia will turn red on the Czech travel traffic light map starting today. All travelers, including Czech citizens and legal residents, must now take a coronavirus test when returning home from any of these countries, the Foreign Ministry said on Twitter Sunday. Until today, these states had been orange on the map, which means a moderate risk of infection, with a negative test for COVID-19 being required only from foreigners arriving for long-term work in the Czech Republic. As of today, Ireland will turn from red to orange on the travel map.

SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY – Deputy Ombudsman Monika Simunkova will focus on the protection of people with disabilities against prejudice and related violence and investigate whether state bodies provide sufficient support to these victims, the Ombudsman Office has written on its website. We consider any statements saying that some people with disabilities are a burden for society or that their life does not have the same value as the life of people without disabilities unacceptable, Simunkova said. She said various hate expressions based on prejudice or wrong ideas about the disabled have recently been appearing in the Czech Republic.

FREEDOM AND DEMOCRACY DAY – The Czech national holiday on November 17, which honors the 1989 Velvet Revolution and past student uprisings in the country, will move online and to broadcast TV this year with officials urging citizens to stay home and enjoy the celebrations in the comfort of their living rooms. Meanwhile, demonstrations against Czech anti-COVID-19 measures are planned to take place in Prague and other locations around the country at the same time. The demonstrations are being organized on social media by Manifest, an initiative created by David Tesař.

POLITICS – Two Freedom and Democracy (anti-EU opposition SPD) MPs want to ban the possibility of allowing NGOs that support sexual minorities, equal opportunities, or work with asylum seekers. SPD leader Tomio Okamura has been criticising these NGOs which he labels "political" for promoting migration, multiculturalism, positive discrimination and "other nonsense". Andrea Krchova, head of the Consortium of NGOs working with migrants in the Czech Republic told CTK that the SPD proposal had no place in a society that respected democratic values and principles of civic society.

CULTURE – Czech Centres in Rotterdam, Rome, Tokyo, Bratislava, and Warsaw took part in events related commemorating philosopher and pedagogue Jan Amos Komensky (Comenius) whose 350th death anniversary was marked Sunday, Czech Centres spokeswoman Petra Jungwirthova told CTK. Comenius based his works on the Czech Hussite tradition and is widely recognised as the founder of modern education. He was born and lived in Moravia. He refused to convert to Catholicism after the defeat of the Czech Protestant nobility's uprising by the Habsburg dynasty in 1620 and was forced into exile in 1628.