Czech morning news in brief: top headlines for June 30, 2021

Prague police Tuesday detained a man suspected of having shot and wounded a woman, who later succumbed to her injuries, in an labour office on Bělehradská street in Prague's center. Police say the motive isn't yet clear but believe the shooting may be related to other criminal activities. The suspect is a man police had been searching for in connection with having attacked a woman with an unknown substance. Police detained the man around shortly after 3:00 p.m. Tuesday. He is suspected of having killed a female clerk with an illegally possessed firearm around 11:00 a.m. Tuesday morning. Following the attack, the shooter managed to flee the premises. Hundreds of police officers, including helicopter units, pursued the suspected shooter. A Czech Labour Office spokesperson later confirmed that the wounded woman was an employee of the labour office branch for Prague 2 and 3 districts. The office on Bělehradská will be closed until Friday and its employees are being offered counseling.

At least 200 demonstrators gathered outside the Czech embassy in Bucharest Tuesday, protesting against the police intervention in Teplice, north Bohemia, after which a Roma man died. Protestors in the Romanian capital, many wearing t-shirts with the text "Racism kills", accused the Czech police of racism. Amateur video footage of the detention of the Roma man in Teplice on June 19 shows a policeman kneeling on his neck for several minutes. The man later died in an ambulance. Czech police have denied any wrongdoing, saying a drug overdose was the cause of death. An official investigation is still going on. One of the protesters’ demands was an independent investigation into the Czech Roma man's death. "A man of ours … was brutally killed by the police. This is proof that brutality against Roma people exists," AP cites Banu Ionut Alin, from the civic group Aresel, as saying. Since the Roma man's death in Teplice, mourning events and protests have been staged in many countries, most recently in Vienna and London at the weekend.

The Czech Foreign Ministry notified Prague officials in a letter today that the city cannot get back a part of Stromovka park used by the Russian embassy since the Czechoslovak cabinet transferred it to the Soviet Union embassy for free permanent use in 1972. In April, the leadership of Prague 7 and the Prague City Hall called on the Czech government to negotiate the return of a part of Stromovka park that was seized when the Soviet-led Warsaw Pact troops invaded Czechoslovakia in 1968 and used by the Russian Embassy since then. During the invasion, the Warsaw Pact troops occupied Stromovka park, establishing their base camp there. After the military left in 1990 and 1991, following the 1989 collapse of the Communist regime, the estate was incorporated into the area of the current Russian Embassy. Prague now aims at reducing its size to the state before the invasion. Prague 7 said will pursue further negotations.

Five cheetah cubs were born in early June in the Dvůr Králove Safari Zoo which is among the most successful zoos in the world for cheetah breeding. The current pride makes up nine animals altogether, zoo spokeswoman Zuzana Boušková told CTK. Two male and three female babies were born in zoo's cheetah run. This birth is considered exceptional as the birth usually takes place in the enclosure at night. The mother cheetah partly hit under a bush as the delivery was very rapid, a zoologist said. When a storm later came, the mother took her cubs into the enclosure area where they are staying now. The zoo has been breeding cheetahs since 1967 and 70 cubs have been born since then.

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