By Jan Cienski in Warsaw and Tony Barber in Brussels

Mirek Topolanek resigned as Czech prime minister on Thursday, handing the political initiative to President Vaclav Klaus and causing anxiety in the EU over the remaining three months of Prague’s European presidency.

Although it lost a vote of confidence on Tuesday, for now Mr Topolanek’s three-party coalition government remains in place until Mr Klaus decides whether to ask him to form a new government or names a new prime minister.

Mr Klaus said that a new government should be formed swiftly, and that he would support whoever is able to gain the support of a majority of parliament – an almost impossible feat given the divisions within the 200-member legislature.

“Klaus is now free to do almost whatever he wants,” said Jiri Pehe, a political scientist in Prague. “It will be very difficult to put together a political government which could gain a majority support in the house of deputies. Klaus can come up with a government of eurosceptics.”

Mr Klaus’s growing influence is the concern of policymakers in other EU countries, who worry about his eurosceptic views and his fierce opposition to the Lisbon treaty reforming the functioning of the union.

The treaty remains unratified in the Czech Republic, and the fear of many EU politicians is that Mr Klaus will exploit the collapse of the Topolanek government to obstruct ratification even more strenuously.

Mr Klaus’s strident views on Europe and the Lisbon treaty are, however, out of step with the opinions of most Czechs, two-thirds of whom support the EU, said Jan Hartl, head of the Stem polling agency.

Jo Leinen, a German Social Democrat who chairs the European parliament’s constitutional affairs committee, said of the Czech Republic: “I can only hope that it won’t be a new EU member-state . . . that will want to block an entire continent and the EU.”

The prospects for ratification of the Lisbon treaty by all 27 EU countries will get a huge boost if Irish voters, who rejected it in a referendum last June, reverse their verdict in a second vote expected in October.

Some German MEPs suggested that, if the Czech Republic were to continue delaying ratification after an Irish Yes, then Germany and like-minded countries would have to consider whether to pursue closer European integration outside the EU’s formal structures.

Between now and June 30, when the Czech Republic hands over the EU presidency to Sweden, the other concern is the impact on the EU’s common foreign policy.

The Czechs were primed to take the world stage next week, when Barack Obama, the US president, is due to visit Prague. The worry is the EU will be weakened by having a recently defenestrated government leading talks on tricky issues like the response to the global economic crisis and plans to build the missile defence shield in central Europe.

It was really nice to know that EU concern as Czech PM quits.


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orange county dui lawyer

Mirek Topolanek resigned as Czech prime minister on Thursday, handing the political initiative to President Vaclav Klaus and causing anxiety in the EU over the remaining three months of Prague’s European presidency.

Although it lost a vote of confidence on Tuesday, for now Mr Topolanek’s three-party coalition government remains in place until Mr Klaus decides whether to ask him to form a new government or names a new prime minister.