Czech government suspends missile defence treaties ratification

Mar 17, 2009, 19:56 GMT

Prague - The Czech government of Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek Tuesday withdrew Czech-US missile defence treaties from Parliament's lower house in a move that prevents the chamber from striking them down.

'It does not mean that we would give up on the ratification process,' Topolanek said at a briefing televised on the CT24 news channel, adding that the cabinet may re-submit the treaties to the house at any time.

Topolanek's weak government suspended the ratification after the opposition Social Democrats pushed the pacts, which allow the United States to build a tracking radar on Czech soil, onto the house agenda at a time when the premier lacks votes for the project.

The premier said that the government plans to reconsider the withdrawal after talks with the administration of US President Barack Obama and the NATO summit to be held in Strasbourg, France, and Kehl, Germany, on April 3-4.

Topolanek has championed plans, pushed forward by the previous US administration of George W Bush, to build missile defence bases in former Eastern Bloc.

To Russia's ire, the Bush administration intended to place the radar in the Czech Republic and 10 interceptor missiles in Poland as a European arm of a system against potential long-range missiles from the so-called rogue states such as Iran.

The Czech Republic and Poland, which continue to back the plan, would like to hear Obama's verdict on the missile shield during his European tour in early April, which is to bring him to the NATO summit and an European Union-US summit in Prague.

So far, Obama said that the need for the missile defence system could diminish if Iran gives up developing nuclear arms and that he would back the project if it works.

The Czech Parliament's upper house, the Senate, approved the radar treaties in December but the unpopular project has faced hurdles in the closely-divided lower house.

Topolanek's frail three-party coalition has 96 votes in the 200-seat chamber and relies on independents - defectors from either the coalition or opposition camps.

Adding to premier's woes, two coalition lawmakers are absent owing to illness and injury.