Czech news in brief for March 6: Friday's top afternoon headlines

Up to 4,900 Czech nationals are still registered in the Foreign Ministry's Drozd travel system as being in countries affected by the current conflict in the Middle East. Those numbers have been slowly but steadily decreasing over the past few days as repatriation flights get in the air, with thousands of Czechs still registered in the United Arab Emirates, and hundreds more in Oman, Jordan, Qatar, Israel and Saudi Arabia.

The Ministry of Finance announced today that they would start monitoring the level of prices at gas stations across the country. As fuel prices continue to rise because of the war raging in the Middle East, authorities say they want to make sure purchase prices for customers are not "artificially and disproportionately" inflated so as to discreetly boost up profit margins under the cover of higher global prices.

The average nominal wage in the Czech Republic increased by a little over 7 percent last year to reach CZK 49,215, the Czech statistical office (CZSO) announced today. Taking inflation into account, real wages increased by 4.6 percent, almost reaching the pre-pandemic level of 2019. Analysts expect real wages to exceed that level in 2026. Regional differences persist, with Prague reporting the highest average wage of over CZK 62,000.

Genre-defying British ensemble Florence and The Machine delivered a first-class act on Thursday evening, mesmerizing tens of thousands of fans in Prague's O2 Arena as part of its Everybody Scream Tour. This was the first appearance in the Czech capital of the indie-rock band led by sensational mystical singer Florence Welsh, after a previous appearance at the Colors of Ostrava festival in 2019.

A record 2.04 million people in the Czech Republic - over a fourth of the country's adult population - participated in this year's Dry February campaign, according to a survey by the ResSOLUTION group for the organizers of the initiative. Famously calling for people to abstain from drinking alcohol and designed to raise awareness about the risks related to consumption, the campaign attracted 31 percent of women and 24 percent of men, according to the study.